scraps & ramblings: "Putting It Up"

There is an expression in the South that means to store your excess harvest. Put it up. I decided to "put it up" this weekend in a big way. The urge to try this started a few months back when I visited my sister in Virginia. She took us to an amazing orchard and we picked 40+ pounds of peaches for canning.

Another motivator was a stack of letters I recently received written by my Grandma to my Grandpa in 1946. Grandma stayed in Michigan to run their farm and care for their four children while Grandpa worked in Alaska. These letters are a testament to the back-breaking, continuous effort it takes to maintain a farm. They "put up" just about anything that grows - I do remember their damp, chilly cellar and what seemed like thousands of jars of food. Here's a snippet from her letters: "Have small ears on the early corn. Dug enough potatoes from 2 hills for supper tonight. Had new spuds and new peas, both from the garden. It is just awfully dry at the moment, so the garden is suffering. Have small tomatoes bigger than unshucked walnuts. The pepper plants are all in bloom." They canned out of necessity - I want to can for pleasure. And I really like to know where my food comes from and how it's processed.

Another inspiration was the September/October issue of Hobby Farm Home magazine that features a pear butter recipe. Not just any pear butter, but Roasted Cinnamon Pear Butter - yum! The recipe calls for regular pears, but after calling several local farms I realized I'd have to use Asian pears. Apparently, the regular varieties were early this year due to the dry spells. So, off the market we went. After checking with dozens of vendors, we finally found Asian pears that were sold either in a bucket or box. I opted for a box - whoa, now that's alot of pears!

I didn't weigh the box until we got home because it started to rain - really, it was more like the heavens opened up and poured, so we had to scoot in a hurry. Bottom line, $20.00 for 26 pounds of pears... crazy cheap. As far as the supplies necessary for canning, I was starting from scratch. One essential tool is a food mill. I found a OXO food mill with 3 different discs for $49.99 at Kitchen and Company. It's very easy to use and clean up. Two other must-have items for canning are jars (obviously) and canning tools. I recommend a home canning kit since it has a funnel, tongs, magnetic lid lifter and all the other goodies for about $10. The small jars average $.50 a piece.

First step - wash, core and quarter the pears. I did this in two batches of 10 pears each.

Asian pears are a cross between an apple and pear. They ripen on the tree, unlike a European pear that ripens after harvest. Who knew? Next is cooking the pears. I love that you don't have to peel these puppies first, you just put about an inch of water in the bottom of a very large pot and cook until tender (about 10 minutes). Then, the pulping begins. I used a medium disc in the food mill until I had 2 quarts of pulp. Easy, but not quick.

Next, I mixed the pulp with 4 cups of sugar in a large roasting pan. Add gobs of cinnamon and the juice & zest of one orange. The directions said cook for 2 hours, after almost 4 hours of stirring occasionally (such a subjective term), the butter was ready to can. I can't describe the smell ... so wonderful!

The final step is boiling the filled jars for 10+ minutes - once the button on top of the jar depresses, voila! I ended up with seven 1/2 pint jars (the recipe said I'd have 8). It's a serious thrill to see all those beauties lined up on the counter, almost as exciting as tasting the finished product.