Canning on a Shoestring Budget

Posted on September 6, 2013 by Sherryn

Thanks to Liz West, who goes by the moniker “Muffet” on Flickr, for providing our featured image, at left, for shared use.

If you’re hyper-vigilant about what you eat, you know that making food at home is one of the the healthiest steps you can take. Not only do you know exactly what you’re eating, but you can shave a few bucks off your food budget.

Since a lot of store-bought canned fruits are packed with preservatives, corn syrup and other miscellaneous chemicals, my boyfriend and I just embarked on canning fresh peaches for the first time. We were both nervous, since the only real “kitchen” stuff we’ve done together is watching Hell’s Kitchen with Gordon Ramsey on the Food Channel. (Oh — and then there was that little chicken mishap …)

Nonetheless, we were ready to cut fruit, heat jars and streamline this peach canning process by unearthing budget-worthy canning tips online. Based on an exhaustive Google search, we found our inspiration in this article — Water Bath Canning With No Equipment — from Penniless Parenting and another from Pick Your Own’s website. By combining tips from both, we hoped to can peaches on a $30 budget.

On a budget like that, we couldn’t afford to shell out $75 on canning supplies. When it came to obtaining mason jars, Penniless Parenting suggested using recycled commercial jars with pop top covers. <WTE NOTE FOR EATERS: There’s quite a bit of controversy over whether it’s okay to reuse jars or lids. The safety experts say unequivocally NO. When it comes to canning, there’s a lot that go wrong. Really wrong. While WTE can’t tell you what you should do — and are NOT condoning any method here — we do suggest doing research on safe canning practices. Lot’s of research!>

After ransacking the house, we came up empty. In the end, we agreed to buy mini mason jars from World Market for $1.20 instead. I naively bought eight jars when, in reality, we only ended up needing three. Don’t make the same mistake I made — make sure you know how much you’ll need, and save jars when you have them. You can also peruse Craigslist or FreeCycle for jars to use.

Neither of us felt the need to go to Whole Foods, Fresh Market, or Wegmans for peaches either. We have an HMart conveniently located 1 mile from us that is renowned for selling dirt-cheap, high-quality produce. It’s a little-known secret in the DC, Maryland, and Virginia (DMV) area, but most H-Mart stores sell fresh, natural fruit for pennies on the dollar.

That said, my boyfriend and I are not fruit experts. We didn’t know how to decipher which was a ripe or unripe peach. I deduced, based on watching sitcoms like Everybody Loves Raymond, that you are supposed to sniff each peach and suggestively grab at it to test for tenderness. As I sniffed and grabbed each peach, my boyfriend gawked and derided me for being nonplussed. Boys!

Since my boyfriend lives a bachelor lifestyle, and I rarely cook, neither of us had a ladle, tongs, or sugar — all of which the recipe called for. Walmart had everything we needed in a cluttered kitchen aisle. Though it was all affordable, we were still apprehensive about buying a water bath pot, since canning might be a one-time endeavor for us. We decided to use this big, black pot for the process. For preheating the jars, we used a rice cooker.

After shopping, our feet, shoulders and heads were aching. Due to our exhaustion, we misinterpreted a few directions from Pick Your Own’s website. I poured three cups of sugar into the water before it began boiling. The sugar fell to the bottom. The directions said to heat the stove on medium heat and to incrementally pour in the sugar every couple of minutes into boiling water.

After realizing our mistake, we both grew frustrated and didn’t want to can at all. So we stayed up all night watching Freaks and Geeks. We wondered how the Freaks from the show would embark on canning. We joked that after a violent food fight, broken jars would litter the ground, smashed peaches would stain the walls and the freaks would get arrested for disorderly conduct.

We decided to try again the next day, dividing the instructions in half based on who had the most knowledge. I was tasked with cleaning mason jars with soap and water. Afterward, my boyfriend boiled the jars in his rice cooker. Since we were dealing with glass, he adjusted the temperature dial so it would gradually increase the temperature. A sudden increase in temperature could result in the glass cracking.

I cleaned, peeled, and chopped the peaches into smaller chunks and slipped them into a vat of lemon juice, which prevents browning. I was nervous about the sugar/water mixture since I had flubbed it the day before. It’s an important step because it helps preserve the peaches. Lucky for me, my boyfriend is an Eagle Scout, and said he’d made a sugar mixture in his youth. While I mixed the sugar and water on medium heat in the pot, he let me know how to tell if the sugar dissolved properly. If the sugar gathered at the bottom, it meant we weren’t doing it correctly.

The mixture was a success! We were finally able to pour the peaches into the hot sugar mixture.

When the jars and lids were heated thoroughly in the rice cooker, I donned mitts and used a ladle to pour the heated peach mixture into each jar. Then we put the heated lids on the jars and sealed them as tightly as we could while still wearing the mitts. Since the jars were wider than the open tongs when my petite fingers held them, I tasked my boyfriend with using the tongs to pick up and place each jar into the pot with the towel on the bottom.

According to Water Bath Canning with No Equipment, if you didn’t have a can rack, you can use a towel. With the towel on the bottom of the pot, the glass jars wouldn’t be as close to the heating element from the stove.

We measured how many jars could fit into our pot, and were fortunate that three jars fit, since we only had enough peaches for three. The pot had to be fully covered to trap the heat. Also, the water level in the pot was supposed to cover the jars completely, but only came up to the bottom of the lids.

Sadly, that was our big mistake. The jars didn’t seal properly, which means NOT SAFE to store. When you can properly, the peaches are supposed to have a shelf life of 12-18 months. But, without proper seals, we figured ours peaches had only days in them. So we seized the moment and ate them right away. The peaches had a fresh taste and the mixture wasn’t thick like it is with other canned peach products.

Failure is never pretty! For the future, we now know what not to do. To help you along, aside from the links above, here are some other great resources you can turn to when canning … and canning cheap. And please, please, do your homework before you start. Improperly canned foods are dangerous. It may be a funny word, but Botulism is no joke.

Enjoy!

Tagged with: budget, canning, cheap, fruit, how-to, peaches, pie, preserving, Sugar, water bath
Posted in Dear Diary

Park, Grill, Drink: It’s A Tailgating Party, Y’all

Posted on August 30, 2013 by Sarah

Summer is winding down as we ease our way into fall. For some, that can be bittersweet. The end of beach season, kids going back to school, cooler temperatures – these aren’t bad things, necessarily, just not so fun. The best thing to do is to focus on the positive.

Baseball playoffs are around the corner!

Football season is about to start!

Even hockey is close!

I love sports — Pittsburgh sports, to be exact. I bleed black and gold. I’m finally celebrating an end to 20 years of losing Pirates’ baseball seasons. And I own number 99’s jersey, the same number a certain bearded Steelers’ defensive end sports while mushing guys aside on the gridiron.

Every Sunday during football season, my husband and I put on our respective jerseys (he’s a fan of the Texans), and kick back at a neighborhood bar or on the couch with the cats. It’s tradition, and we love it. There’s drama, excitement, the joy of a win … or the sorrow of defeat. And during it all, we’re munching on food and sipping on ice cold drinks.

This year, I’m stepping up my game. We’ve got tickets to see the Steelers game for my birthday this fall, and we’re hosting our first tailgate. It’s a parking lot party, y’all!

Most of you Eaters out there have been to one. Before, during or after a game, imagine a parking lot packed full of parked cars and trucks, opened up in the back (hence the “tailgate”) and people milling about everywhere. It’s about grilling, drinking, and bonding with other fans. Games, like cornhole or washers, are set up, eliciting laughter or trash talk. It can be hot and humid, or freezing. Even snowing! It’s all part of the experience.

You can tailgate almost anywhere, for almost any event and with almost any size party. I often see little tailgates set up in the parking lot of outdoor pavilions before a concert, with simply a few beers and light food. And then there’s the opposite. Jimmy Buffet rolls into a concert pavilion near our house in Virginia every summer … and the Parrotheads follow large, partying out of their RVs with full spreads.

Word of warning: Before you show up with all your food and gear, double check with the venue to verify their tailgating rules. I had invited everyone in my rolodex to a minor league baseball game when I thought to call the ticketing office. They didn’t allow open flames, so no grill. They also didn’t allow alcohol. There goes the party!

Here are some tips I’ve learned so far, which I intend to apply to my tailgate:

Theme your food and drinks around the team you’re rooting for or the band you’re seeing. What beers are local to the area? Are there particular foods that the city is famous for? In Pittsburgh, they drink Iron City Beer and eat pierogi. In Houston it’s beef — marinated and grilled — washed down with a Shiner.
Prep as much as you can before the party. Remember, you’re partying out of your car! Even if you bring a table to set up, space will be limited. And there’s no sink. Foods like salads, sides, finger foods and dips can all be done ahead of time. On-site, spend time preparing the star of your meal – stuff on the grill! That said, even grilled foods, like the bacon-wrapped shrimp below, can be prepped ahead of time.
Don’t forget the essential gear! Coolers with plenty of ice, popup chairs, a table or two and, of course, the grill. Remember to fill the propane tank or grab the briquettes, too. And of course, gear yourself out as well. Wear the colors, the band shirts, everything: Today is the reason you bought that stuff!
Make sure you give yourself plenty of time. If it’s a popular venue for tailgating, be aware. Heinz Field tailgaters in Pittsburgh start showing up by 8:00 a.m. the morning of the game. And don’t forget cleaning up. Get started early — you don’t want to be late to the game!

So, I have a challenge on my hands! But with all these little tips, it should be a breeze. There are plenty of web sites and forums out there that will help you with planning. You can even hook up with other tailgaters through these sites. Join forces! You’re all there for the same reason.

To get you started, here’s a super yummy recipe for bacon-wrapped shrimp on the grill. They’re great for any tailgate: bite sized, a little spicey, and bacon! My Houston-born-and-raised husband inspired this grilled treat. We served these up to some friends along with some bacon-jam topped burgers during a faux-tailgate we hosted at our house. They were crowd pleasers!

Bacon Wrapped, Jalapeno and Cheese Stuffed Shrimp
I found this recipe on Serious Eats. The author was trying to recreate an appetizer from a local Houston area chain, Pappasitos. The verdict is YES: It’s a winner!

2 pounds large shrimp, peeled, deveined and rinsed
2 teaspoons garlic powder
2 teaspoons paprika
2 teaspoons ground black pepper
½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
2 ounces Monterey Jack cheese, cut into thin strips
3 jalapenos, halved, seeded and cut into thin slices
1 pound bacon, halved
¼ cup butter, melted
1 lime, quartered

Mix together the garlic powder, paprika, black pepper and cayenne pepper. In a separate bowl, toss the shrimp with ¾ of the mixture, coating evenly.

To stuff the shrimps, cut a slit in the base of the shrimp that is about ¾ long as the base. Put a jalapeno slice and a chees slice into the slit. Wrap the shrimp with half a slice of the bacon.

Thread shrimp onto toothpicks one-by-one or a bunch on a skewer. Season with the rest of the spice mixture and brush lightly with the melted butter.

Fire up the grill and allow to preheat for about 5 minutes. Oil or spray the grilling grate with non-stick spray to ensure the shrimp wont stick. Grill the shrimp skewers over high heat about two to three minutes on each side. Remove and serve with lime wedges.

Tagged with: Bacon, Cheese, Grill, Houston, jalapeno, party, shrimp, tailgating
Posted in Dear Diary

Tucking In Tentside: Skip The Baked Beans!

Posted on August 23, 2013 by April

Like every good Northwesterner, I enjoy camping. Clean air, hiking, the time and space to think, smores!

Yet, somehow, I rarely end up actually doing it. In large part that’s because, frankly, I hate trying to sleep in the cold and damp (much less a downpour). And unfortunately, being from Seattle, my formative camping experiences all involved — yup, you guessed it — trying to sleep in the cold and damp … often in a downpour.

Sadly, I’m not much better with humidity. In my book, being hot and damp is only marginally preferable to being cold and damp. And now that I’m an East-Coaster, camping all too often involves — yes, that’s right — being hot and damp.

So, it’s not that I dislike sleeping in the great outdoors — I’m just … picky. Not too hot, not too cold, not too wet and I’m golden. Let’s call it the Goldilocks theory of camping.

Naturally, Murphy’s Law ensured that my most recent camping adventure involved a sticky summer weekend, a deluge of Biblical proportions, a leaky (shall I say, porous?) tent and a fast-growing puddle that transformed the tent floor into a waterbed.

But hey, we had a blast. We had Taboo. We had beverages. And the rain stopped well before bedtime, giving us a chance to move the tent to higher ground and, thankfully, get a good night’s sleep. (Well, except for the 3 a.m. air-raid siren. True story.)

Despite the frightening wee-hour interruption (never satisfactorily explained, mind you), all was well by breakfast. And that’s why you’re here, after all — to talk food! When you’re car camping with a portable two-burner gas stove, as we were, there’s little you can’t make tentside. (Backpacking, with all your gear in your pack, rather than your trunk, is a whole other level of intensity that I’ll leave to the experts — these sites are full of great ideas.)

Most folks fall into one of two camps on camp food: foodies who recreate gourmet meals (this is where Amy would end up!), and purists who believe camping is for hot dogs, baked beans and instant oatmeal.

Goldilocks April is right in the middle on this one. While I love cooking fancy meals, I just can’t square the notion of lamb and couscous with a weekend spent a bit grimy. That said, there’s no reason to forego fresh, nutritious foods just because you’re outdoors. For me, when you’re camp cooking, tasty but healthy practicality is the name of the game: I go for simple dishes made with wholesome foods that cook up fairly quickly and require no preservative-laden ingredients. (And if you do prefer the fancy approach, never fear! Here are some great resources to get you started.)

: andrewmalone via Flickr

Since I was in charge of breakfast, scrambled eggs were a no-brainer. But there’s no need to stick to plain eggs — fresh extras that hold up well in a cooler are what make camp eggs worth eating. I brought along shredded sharp cheddar cheese, salsa (fresh is best, but I used Herdez, which contains nothing but tomatoes, onions, serranos, salt and cilantro), all topped off with chives, green onions and cilantro (chopped up at home, wrapped in a damp paper towel and stowed in a ziplock). If you’ve remembered to bring a skillet, some oil and a bit of milk, and you’re in business.

And word to the wise: it’s best to bring the eggs in a plastic, rather than a cardboard carton. By morning there’s little ice left in an ice cooler, and a waterlogged, disintegrated carton may leave you trawling for eggs. Then again, after fishing your tent out of a puddle-lake, perhaps that’s only fitting.

Dressed-Up Scrambled Eggs

Serves 6-8

Oil for pan
18 eggs
1/4 cup milk
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup shredded cheese

For garnishing:
Several tablespoons each chopped cilantro and chives
3 chopped green onions
More shredded cheese for sprinkling
Avocado slices
Salsa
Hot sauce, if someone remembered to bring it

Heat oil in a large skillet, preferably non-stick, over a medium-low flame.

While the oil’s heating, whisk eggs, milk, salt and pepper together. When the pan is hot, add eggs and allow to just begin to set on the bottom. Gently muddle them by scraping the bottom of the pan, and allow to just set again. Add the shredded cheese and continue the muddling and setting, muddling and setting, until the eggs are as wet or dry as you prefer. This actually took quite a while on our camp stove, but take care not to turn the flame up too high or you will scorch the eggs on the bottom. In other words, you have to be patient!

Serve up the eggs and let people help themselves to the garnishes. Easy. Delicious.

Tagged with: Camping, chives, cilantro, eggs, herbs, salsa, scrambled eggs
Posted in Dear Diary