3:26pm Friday 16th July 2010
The productive kitchen gardener has to become an expert at dealing with gluts; but the delight of tasting fruits and vegetables, preserved in summer, during the fallow winter season is well worth all the work involved.
Knowing that what you eat has been grown to your standards, without incurring the air-miles associated with bought imported foods, is immensely satisfying and much less expensive.
There are a number of products now on the market that make the task much more easy; some revive the tried and tested processes of a former generation and some have been recently developed to speed up or simplify production.
The picking of berries and soft fruits can be a time consuming and often prickly process, especially where blackberries & gooseberries are concerned.
A handy Swedish berry picker, which quickly “combs” fruits off their stalks into an integral container, is ideal for the job – the fruits can then be poured into your collection basket.
The robust picker has a comfortable handle, comes in two sizes and offers protection from the nasty thorns that can make picking an ordeal.
Sometimes it’s beneficial to have two hands free to pick, for instance with fruits such as plums, damsons, apples and pears and vegetables like peas, beans and sweet corn.
There is a welded rubber mesh-harvesting bag on the market that has two handles and also a strap that can be worn across the shoulders or round the waist, which is real boon.
It feels safer to balance on an orchard ladder to pick hard-to-reach fruits when you have a free hand to hold on!
Once picked, preserving by pasteurisation is a successful way of storing fruits and vegetables so that they can be used in times when fresh food is scarce and freezer space is limited.
It is so satisfying to have jars of delicious food, ready prepared just waiting to be opened and served.
The wonderfully comprehensive “Weck Home-Canning Book” is the definitive guide to preserving a whole host of produce.
It is practical and easy-to-follow, detailing both the science of the pasteurising process as well as giving more than 250 recipes.
It has sections on preserving berries, fruits, vegetables, fish, meat, jams, jellies, pickles as well as fruit juices and cordials.
Weck also produces the only preserving jars on the market where it is possible to check that preservation has been properly completed.
The lids with rubber seals are initially secured by small clips that are removed once the food has been pasteurised. By doing a lid-seal test, lifting the jar by its lid to check on the vacuum created in the heating process, you can be assured of the success of the process.
If the lid stays on, the contents of the jar are fine. There are also special wide aperture funnels for ease of jar filling and extra stay-fresh caps so that once opened, the jar contents can be kept in the fridge for a short period.
So what is pasteurisation and how do you do it?
Pasteurisation is a heating process that kills off the micro-organisms that are present in food and in the air, for example yeasts, bacteria, or mould spores. When food is pasteurised in a preserving jar the potential spoilers in the food, as well as in the air trapped in the jar, are killed.
The jar is sealed by means of a lid, rubber seals and clips which, under high pressure, act as a one-way valve letting out air & steam. When the process is successfully completed and the product is cooled, a vacuum is created inside the jar making a permanent seal therefore offering long-term protection to the produce.
The jar clips are then superfluous and should be removed - the seal of the jar being maintained by normal air pressure exerted on the lid.
Different types of food require different pasteurising temperatures and lengths of time to ensure that they safely processed, so it is necessary that time and temperature settings are accurate and recipe instructions are followed exactly.
Special small pasteurising machines with both thermostat and timer controls are available in both stainless steel and enamel models; these can hold either 14x1lt preserving jars double stacked or 13x75cl juice bottles and are very reliable and easy to use.
Both of these machines can have a steam juice extraction accessory so that juices and cordials can also be easily made.
So with a small investment of money and time you could be dining well on your surplus garden produce all year round.
A comprehensive range of these products is available from Vigo Ltd. Visit vigopresses.co.uk or call 01404 892 101 n
© Copyright 2001-2012 Newsquest Media Group
http://www.smallholder.co.uk/trade_directory/