Menu Idea Monday: Strawberry Lemonade Concentrate

I've been slacking a bit on Menu Idea Mondays, but I'm back on track today! Over the weekend, a new friend invited me to go strawberry picking and I brought home six quarts brimming with gorgeous berries. In addition to putting up some strawberry balsamic jam, I made Strawberry Lemonade Concentrate, a recipe I picked up from the Canning Homemade blog.

Photo from Canning Homemade blog

Check out the color in this photo! I am not talented enough to take such great shots myself, but mine came out the same shade - gorgeous!

This is a great recipe for a couple reasons:

1. The end result is very flexible - you can mix the concentrate with water, ginger ale, champagne, kombucha, water keifer - almost anything!

2. It's only three ingredients - strawberries, lemon juice and sugar. No poisonous imitation sugars, neurotoxic food coloring or preservatives. Also, it's free of gluten and just about every other major allergen!

3. There's an easy sugar-free option! You could can an healthier, more natural version of this by subbing honey for the sugar. If you opt to freeze the concentrate instead of canning it (not in your canning jars, please!), you can skip the sugar altogether. Just sweeten to taste with stevia or your preferred natural sweetener when you reconstitute it! It you use something already fairly sweet like ginger ale, you may not have to add any sweetener at all.

Either way, anyone used to cooking berries down for jam will be surprised and pleased by how far the berries go in this recipe - six cups of strawberries will make you 3 quarts of concentrate! I'm happy to have found this recipe and expect to make it a regular part of my canning rotation.

Summer Cookbook Season

If you are a library addict   (i.e. all the librarians know you by name and automatically head to the shelf for your 'on hold' items when you walk in the door) then you probably already know what I'm about to tell you: right now is the best time to check out summer cookbooks! (Canning books, too, incidentally.)

Pre- season is always the best time to pick up popular books, especially cookbooks. Putting things on hold or picking up a couple titles each time you're at the library ensures you've already seen everything you need before everyone else realizes that it's time to fire up the grill and they have no idea what to make!

This habit can be an especially big help if you:
* don't shop (or get to the library) often
* prefer batch cooking
* menu plan more than a week in advance
* have picky eaters or dietary restrictions

Not sure where to start? Here are a few of my newest discoveries:

 This is pretty much a grilling Bible. Loved it!
If you are old hat at grilling and are looking for something more adventurous, try Soaked, Slathered and Seasoned.

This isn't specifically a summer cookbook, but its yummy recipes are easy, company-worthy and written with busy cooks in mind. If your summer days tend to be long and full, this could made meal time much easier!

Can you really go wrong with a cookbook devoted to cheese? The selection in here was excellent in every category from breakfast to dessert. Whether it's lazy summer mornings with time to cook a real breakfast or scrounging for something satisfying to bring to a family picnic, you'll find great options here.

Don't let the ho-hum cover of this one fool you - this is a must have! I have never seen this many yummy sounding vegetable dishes in one place. Ever. No crazy ingredients or expensive garnishes. Just great, simple ways to use and love summer produce!





This is the best cookie cookbook ever. Of all time. Find it - ASAP!







 Finally, for my fellow canners out there, check this out. Everyone needs a copy of the Ball Blue Book or Putting Food By, but if you're looking to expand your repertoire this has some delicious and different ideas.

What's your favorite source for summer recipes?

A Jarring Reality

Though I've read that canning is experiencing a resurgence in popularity, I don't personally know almost anyone else who does it. So it has been a bafflement to me why it is so hard to find canning jars. Granted, the stores around here don't carry as many because of anticipated low demand but still, there seemed to be a mysterious dearth of this valuable commodity – even second hand.

Then, while looking for something else entirely, I uncovered the culprits – crafters!! Crafters and non-canning foodies are snapping up jars left and right for a dizzying myriad of projects!

Sure, I understand that canning jars are perfect for hot cocoa and other gifts from the kitchen.




I understand that cupcakes in a jar are still a hot trend.







And yes, mini pumpkin pies in a jar are such a fun idea I might even have to make some myself (if I can find enough jars)...


Who can argue with the creativity and frugality of using (and reusing) glass jars when there are awesome, photo-illustrated lists of 50 ideas at a time?


Still, with harvest season in full swing and canning jars at a premium, I'd like to offer a few humble suggestions for anyone who - like me - is finding canning jars in short supply.

1. Consider picking up antique canning jars at your local flea market or antique store. Although not suitable for canning any more, they're just as functional for things like organizing buttons or holding flowers.

2. Take advantage of pretty, similarly sized/shaped glass jars not designed for canning that can be substituted for mason jars in most crafting projects.

2. Make good use of chipped jars. Even tiny chips on the rim of a jar compromise their ability to seal and knock an otherwise lovely jar out of the "functional" category - but they remain perfect candidates for any other food-related uses like mini pies, cupcakes and as pretty display dishes. (Tip: mark the bottom of chipped jars with nail polish for quick and easy identification so they don't accidentally get put back with your good jars!)

3. Watch craigslist and local estate sales. Discretely spread the word that you can or craft. This hasn't panned out for me, but I know some people have made a killing when friends, family or locals clean out their stash of unused jars. It's worth a try!

4. Try to plan ahead and consider buying your jars in bulk. I've had great luck with two different locally owned hardware stores with this. I stop in during canning season (earlier the better) and ask if they'll bring in four cases or so for me. It doesn't cost any extra, since they were already bringing in an order, and I know I'm getting exactly the size and type I want. They call me when it comes in, and I'm good to go! (Added bonus: since I didn't wipe out their shelves picking up what I needed the first time through, I can go back and snag an extra case or two later if I underestimated or get a windfall of produce!)

(Psst... canners! Have you seen Tipnut's 85+ Recipes For Home Canning, Under the Table's 50 Different Foods You Can Put in a Jar and Marisa's Food in Jars Canning Blog? Wow!)

More Canning

If you'd asked me any year prior to this what my favorite fall scents were, I would have said something normal like apple pie or cinnamon stick candles. This year, I have a new favorite - the tang of brown sugary vinegar simmering on the stove in a pot full of peaches, waiting to be put up for midwinter decadence. Yum!

I love the pickled pear and pickled peaches recipes I found this year, and since both fruits were on sale for a really good price I picked up a couple pounds of each and put up a few pints. In addition, I canned four quarts of cider, a pint of mulled cider, and four more quarts of applesauce. (My kitchen looked like a war zone with pots and pans and cooking utensils piled everywhere... but I eventually got it all scrubbed down and it was so worth it!) Walking into my pantry and seeing shelves of produce canned or dehydrated from the bounty of summer and fall gives me a huge feeling of success and calm. When this unending spell of rain gives way to snow, I'll be prepared!

Of course, I was carefully supervised by my faithful nitro-puppy, who is keenly interested in all kitchen chores because they result in food... he likes food! Here you can see one of his best "Look, I'm cute - you should feed me!" grins. :0)

Sorry for the quality of the pictures. The camera, understandably, is in on the other side of the planet with my husband, so my cell phone is standing in. I'm grateful it works, but haven't quite mastered taking really great pictures with it yet!

Unbelievable Find

Once upon a time, before Martha Stewart, Rachel Ray, Ms. Manners, and Dear Abby, there was Isabella Beeton. Mrs. Beeton was the ultimate domestic goddess of the victorian era. For decades, women were given two books when they married: a Bible, and Mrs. Beeton's Book of Household Management. It was commonly assumed that they would encounter nothing in married life for which they would not find instruction in one of those two texts.

Understandbly, I was fascinated and wanted to get my hands on a copy. That's when I discovered something very disheartening; the "updated version" popularly available has had everything of use and interest edited out and the original version runs in the $300+ range. While it baffles me how a book so frequently printed and purchased could be so hard to find, all the bookstore owners and antique store proprietors I spoke to agreed: my only chance of finding such a book would be finding someone who didn't know what they had.

So while I continued to search, and my mom generously agreed to look while she was out and about, I didn't hold out much hope. So when she said she had a suprise for me and handed me a real original copy of Mrs. Beeton's I was stunned!! And delighted. And amazed. Even more so when she told me what a steal it was! She definitely found someone who didn't know what they had!

Yes, that is a complete calf's head in the illustration on the right. Some of the recipes in the book are wild! It's going to take a while to read, but the sheer breadth of information covered is incredible. Besides a comprehensive cookbook, it contains a primer on legal documents, a broad medical reference section, a handbook on managing household staff and a full guide to manners and hostessing for any social occasion you can think of. I am so excited to have my own copy!

I'll hold off on bubbling any more, since I'm sure they'll be lots more bubbling as I work my way through. In the meantime, lest everyone think I've nothing to do but leisure reading, I confess I've spent most of yesterday and today in the kitchen.

On the left is the beginnings of all natural vanilla extract. (Yes, I know. Bad picture makes it look like an alien in a bottle, but I promise it's not.) When it's done steeping, I will have 100% authentic vanilla extract at 1/10th the cost of the commercial equivalent. Whoo hoo!On the right is canned eggplant. At 75c a piece, the eggplant I picked up at the farmer's market on Saturday was unbeatable. Now it's safely canned up, ready to go into pasta, bruchetta, veggie lasagne or any number of other goodies this winter. Still waiting to be canned are peaches, strawberries, plums, onions and green beans. Thank goodness I'm married to a patient man who doesn't mind my playing in the kitchen!

Book Reviews

Yes, I know... lots of posts recently. But there's a lot going on!
Four quick book reviews today. (And no pictures, because I'm REALLY annoyed with blogger's inability to properly format them...sorry...)

Audubon Society Encyclopedia of North American Birds - obviously haven't read it yet... Purchased as a reference material, intial review seems impressive. Excellent illustrations and sketches, clear and easy to read descriptions and all kinds of fascinating facts in easy to use format.

The Book of Preserves - the beginning of my quest to read everything I can get my hands on relating to preserving and food storage. Not a bad start; I've copied out several simple recipes. Not going on my list of resources worth owning, however. Just not that helpful.

Putting Food By - considering one of the classic tomes of preserving wisdom, this is a clearing house of basic information on canning processes and safety. I have my eye on the companion book, Putting Food Up with Honey, but this will definitely make the need-a-copy-for-my-shelf list! If you're new to canning, it's a good place to start.

unChristian - picked up at the library on a whim, this turned out to be fantastic. A little dry, but precious in content: three years of research into what people really think about Christians and why. Most of it rang soundly true. I would love to see this book get in the hands of pastors and ministry leaders. A valuable read for everyone, no matter where you stand.