September means it is time for some serious preserve making. A variety of reasons prompt this urge: economy - six jars of jam for the price of a 1kg bag of sugar; quality - no artificial rubbish included in the recipes and the flavour of fruit rushes through; maybe a deep desire to protect and provide for one's family for the coming winter; and curiosity - there are things I can make that are hard or impossible to buy.
It was curiosity that pushed me to make cheese. Not milk cheese, but fruit cheese. I occasionally buy membrillo, the Spanish quince preserve that is served with cold meats or 'proper' cheese. It costs a fortune. So with a magnificent crop of quinces to use up I decided to make my own. Both of the quinces (magnificent is overstating things, but the tree is young so maybe next year...) were chopped small and simmered with about a kg of apples until really soft, then put through a jelly bag for several hours. The resulting liquid was just over half a pint, so a 1/2 lb of sugar was added to the reheated juice and stirred and stirred, spluttering gobbets of red-hot jam, until it was the consistency of hot tar.
I ended up with two ramekins of apple and quince cheese. The smell is great. One ramekin for eating now, one in the freezer to be used later as a treat.
There is something addictive about making preserves. It's easy to get carried away and make so much that you never use it. But tiny batches like that are a way to pass a dullish Sunday evening, and if they are something special all the better. And atheist that I am there is a certain appeal to the ancestral Puritan in me of making the best of what we are given. I have, however, decided against closing all the theatres in Britain, cancelling Christmas and banning Morris dancing, though I agonised over that last one.
Showing posts with label preserving food. Show all posts
Showing posts with label preserving food. Show all posts
Monday, 23 September 2013
Thursday, 10 January 2013
Half the World's Food Wasted
The Institute of Mechanical Engineers has garnered headlines with its report stating that up to half the world's food goes to waste. Some of the causes are beyond ordinary households to fix, but there are plenty of actions we can take to make some difference.
1: Buy local fruit and vegetables from local markets, where how a potato looks, or the size of a turnip, or a little blemish on an apple, are not regarded as vital. If you buy from supermarkets, make a point of buying stuff like the 'basic' bags of peppers, which are misshapes and 'the wrong size' (what utter bureaucratic idiocy, wherever it comes from). They, like market produce, are cheaper and taste no damn different.
2: If you grow your own, use it. Either side of us neighbours have perfectly good fruit trees that over the years have been little picked if at all. Happily we have been allowed to harvest the damsons from a tree on one side and mirabelles from a much neglected tree on the other. New occupants of the damson side so I hope they make the best of what they have available fresh and free.
And strangely I have noticed how some fellow allotment growers don't harvest some of their crops, either because they are grown out of habit though not liked, or too much of something is grown (so gift them), or a touch of the can't be bothereds sets in.
3: Learn to use leftovers. All it takes is a little imagination: yesterday I was making a big omelette for our evening meal, into which cubed went three stovie potatoes left from the previous day, bulking out the onion, yellow pepper (yes, basics range) and Parmesan.
4: Don't buy on automatic. I wonder how internet grocery purchases are affecting wastage - we all tend to laziness, and not changing a list even if you go off something, or have plenty already, is going to lead to waste.
5: Learn to preserve stuff better. That may be simply keeping certain fruits and veggies in the fridge, or actually making pickles and jams. Last year was rubbish for apples, strawberries and raspberries here, what we got was eaten fresh or made into ice cream as regards soft fruit, so no jams or jellies made for once. But we have some from 2011 still good.
6: In a country where obesity is a major problem, think about portion size.
The economic benefits will be immediate if the shopping bill is reduced, as it can be for most of us. But longer term as demand drops here so should prices, and the developing world will get a better share of food resources. It won't cure the planet's ills, but every little helps.
Another action, not for everybody though: get chickens (who love leftover spuds, greens, stale bread, cucumber skin if you don't use it, any toms that have got mould, etc etc). One fine day we'd love to have a pig or two, though as our deeds say we can't that has to wait until we move sometime in the future.
1: Buy local fruit and vegetables from local markets, where how a potato looks, or the size of a turnip, or a little blemish on an apple, are not regarded as vital. If you buy from supermarkets, make a point of buying stuff like the 'basic' bags of peppers, which are misshapes and 'the wrong size' (what utter bureaucratic idiocy, wherever it comes from). They, like market produce, are cheaper and taste no damn different.
2: If you grow your own, use it. Either side of us neighbours have perfectly good fruit trees that over the years have been little picked if at all. Happily we have been allowed to harvest the damsons from a tree on one side and mirabelles from a much neglected tree on the other. New occupants of the damson side so I hope they make the best of what they have available fresh and free.
And strangely I have noticed how some fellow allotment growers don't harvest some of their crops, either because they are grown out of habit though not liked, or too much of something is grown (so gift them), or a touch of the can't be bothereds sets in.
3: Learn to use leftovers. All it takes is a little imagination: yesterday I was making a big omelette for our evening meal, into which cubed went three stovie potatoes left from the previous day, bulking out the onion, yellow pepper (yes, basics range) and Parmesan.
4: Don't buy on automatic. I wonder how internet grocery purchases are affecting wastage - we all tend to laziness, and not changing a list even if you go off something, or have plenty already, is going to lead to waste.
5: Learn to preserve stuff better. That may be simply keeping certain fruits and veggies in the fridge, or actually making pickles and jams. Last year was rubbish for apples, strawberries and raspberries here, what we got was eaten fresh or made into ice cream as regards soft fruit, so no jams or jellies made for once. But we have some from 2011 still good.
6: In a country where obesity is a major problem, think about portion size.
The economic benefits will be immediate if the shopping bill is reduced, as it can be for most of us. But longer term as demand drops here so should prices, and the developing world will get a better share of food resources. It won't cure the planet's ills, but every little helps.
Another action, not for everybody though: get chickens (who love leftover spuds, greens, stale bread, cucumber skin if you don't use it, any toms that have got mould, etc etc). One fine day we'd love to have a pig or two, though as our deeds say we can't that has to wait until we move sometime in the future.
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