preserving tradition

For a year or two now I have been dreaming of canning my own pickles, jams, jellies and goodness. As a kid, I remember each of my Grammys making their own jellies... going out to the garden to pick pomegranates for jelly, picking cucumbers for pickles, and peaches for canning. I think that is one of the reasons I love pickles so much, as a kiddo, it was my number one snack and I remember on several occasions grabbing a pickle or two as my snack before heading outdoors to begin my wild obnoxious adventures.

When I first decided to take the plunge into canning I asked my Ma if we still had the recipe my Grammy would use for her pickles. I remember everyone on the block and the whole family being really excited to get some of her home canned pickles. And alas, my Ma found the recipe and home canned pickles are back in action and the tradition survives! The total time it took me to complete the actual process was only a few hours, I see myself in the future, or whenever I get more storage space or a basement devoting a week or so a year to canning everything possible and always being able to have homemade jams, jellies and pickles available to eat.

The recipe I used. It was ridiculously simple, requiring some patience, a few spices and a bit vinegar. I had to recreate the brine at least 3 times to make the amount of liquid I needed to cover and contain all the pickles I had made. 

I made a few investments in a big ass water bath canner (with a wire rack) and a few utensils like a funnel, lid grabber and can grabber (the can grabber was necessary). I figured I should just go ahead and make the purchase on these items since this was going to be an ongoing thing...

 Before I started the process I went the library (and visited a few blogs) to get a home canning book, just to compare recipes and found a great book on general preserving... I think my next creation will be orange marmalade, since I have about 15 oranges sitting at my house right now, thanks to Albert and Eve.

When I got the idea to make pickles I thought of no better way to share them than to give them as my Christmas presents this year, and let me tell you what a big hit they were... I made at least 20 cans and in the end, barely had enough to go around, I suppose that orange marmalade cant come soon enough... :)