Produced by
Patti Moreno
Contributor to:
How to Can and Preserve Food
If you've had any success with your garden, you'll find that your trees sometimes produce more ripe fruit at once than you're able to eat. So what should you do with all those extra pears and blueberries? Freeze them? Give them away? Let them go bad? You could. But I'm going to show you some cool methods for preserving your garden goodies for your own use later. By making jam, jelly, or preserves, canning, and even dehydrating your fresh fruit. Waste not, want not! Now you can enjoy your fruit and veggies all year round. Take a look!
How to Preserve Pears
My family loves pears! Because pears are so easy to grow, we always have a surplus. Today, I am going to show you a delicious way to hold on to the many pears that you will have once you start.
Today I am working with Bartlett Pears which are the most common pears and you see them all the time in the supermarket. The reason that pears are so abundant is that they come from huge trees that are very prolific. One pear tree can produce as many as 400 pounds of pears.
Read more...How to Dehydrate Persimmons
Today I’m hanging out with persimmons! What are those? Persimmons are an unusual fruit that you don’t hear a lot about, but I’m here to tell you that most people don’t know what they’re missing. Today I am dehydrating persimmons because they are a delicious, healthy snack. Besides, I have a ton of `em. My two Persimmon trees are quite prolific. Watch carefully because while I’m at it, I’ll even throw in a lesson on how to use a dehydrator, which is something that every gardener should have. What else would you do with all of that extra fruits and vegetables? To maximize the food you can produce you need to know how to preserve your harvest. There are many different ways to preserve fruit. Dehydrating them is a great way to preserve your fruit.
Read more...Preserving Fruit: How to Make Jam
Today I am making Jam. It is the easiest and tastiest snack to come out of your edible landscape, and your family will love it. I like to make an unusual jam which is a mixture of grapes and blueberries.
I take my fresh or thawed grapes and blueberries and puree them. The pureer is a great tool because it separates the good stuff from the bad. Once you mix the juices together and they come out of the pureer, give it a taste it to see if it's sweet enough. The pure fruit is very tasty but the sweetness of your jam depends on you and your family's personal preference. I like to add just a little more sugar. I put the sugar and the juices on the stove to boil.
Read more...How to Make Pickles
One great way to preserve all of those delicious fresh vegetables for the winter is by pickling them. In this video, Iʼll take you step by step through the process of seasoning, jarring, and sealing up your cucumbers to make tasty, crunchy pickles right in your own kitchen.
The first step is to choose the right pickles. You want to pick them before they get overripe, because the canning process can make them soggy if theyʼre too tender to begin with. A good pickling cucumber is one that is fully grown, but still that bright green color.
Read more...How to Preserve Vegetables Using a Vacuum Sealer
It's finally harvest time, and some of us are producing more food than we could possibly eat all at once! Don't fear, you can keep your veggies fresh for over 6 months by vacuum sealing them! In this video, Iʼm going to walk you through the process of sealing up your produce air-tight to store in the freezer all winter long.
A vacuum sealer is a really handy appliance, and a staple for the home vegetable gardener. You can get them online or in kitchen supply stores, and they come in a wide range of brands and prices, so choose one based on your needs.
Read more...How to Preserve Herbs in Ice Cubes
Basil and parsley are some of my favorite herbs, and theyʼre so easy to grow. But that means I usually end up with more of it than I could possibly use all at once. But not to worry, basil and parsley are easy to preserve all winter long by freezing them into ice cubes. Iʼn this video, Iʼll show you how.
Instead of drying them on the stem as you would with some other herbs, you want to remove all the leaves from your basil and parsley and stuff them into a couple of ice cube trays.
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