Marisa McClellan's Blog, page 100

Giveaway: The Preservationist Gift Set from MightyNest

I hope everyone had a very happy Thanksgiving yesterday! As today marks the traditional beginning of the holiday shopping season, I’m sharing some very fun gift ideas from our friends at MightyNest. They’ve teamed up with four cookbook authors/bloggers to create gift-ready kits for your favorite people.

There’s a Blender Girl set (for your juice and smoothie fans), the Traditionalist set from Jenny at Nourished Kitchen, a Real Foodie set filled with Lisa Leake’s favorites, and the Preservationist set, which includes the 4th burner pot, a case of mini tulip Weck jars, and a copy of Preserving by the Pint.

The Preservationist set costs just $85.90 and would make a really good gift for someone who wanted to get started with small batch preserving! Another great thing about buying from MightyNest this weekend is that they are giving back 20% of your entire to the school of your choice through Monday, December 1. That means that if you buy the Preservationist set, $17 will go back to whichever school you select.

And because no Black Friday is complete without a giveaway, the folks at MightyNest have given me one of the Preservationist kits to give away to a Food in Jars reader. Just click on the pledge below to entire. Happy shopping!

Related Posts:

Giveaway: Bake Your Bundt Off with MightyNest
MightyNest Giveaway Winner
Weck Jar FAQ and MightyNest Giveaway

Cranberries for Thanksgiving and Beyond

I realize that Thanksgiving is mere moments away, but I thought I’d do a quick round-up of my personal cranberry-centric writing, just in case anyone was still searching for a new jam, chutney, or sauce for this year. Additionally, while these preserves are most traditional on the fourth Thursday in November, they also make good accents (and gifts!) throughout the holiday season.

First up are my cranberry-based jams. These spreads can be served on Thanksgiving morning on a toasted scone, or with the turkey later that day. Because cranberries have so much natural pectin, these jams make an excellent filling in thumbprint cookies because they won’t get runny during baking.

Spiced cranberry jam
Apple cranberry jam
Pear cranberry jam

Now for sauces and marmalades. These tend to be a little less sweet than the jams above, but just as delicious

My now-classic “canned” cranberry sauce
Basic cranberry jelly
Cranberry marmalade
Cranberry quince sauce

The rest of these cranberry items resist being grouped into a single category. There’s my pickled cranberries, which may well be my favorite cranberry preserve ever and pair up best with dark meat. A couple years back, I wrote a piece for Grid Philly that featured cranberries, and the oven-roasted butternut squash and cranberry dish in that article is one I love.

If you prefer cranberries in quick breads, these mini-loaves will please you (of course, they can also be baked in a muffin tin or even a conventional loaf pan).

Another delicious cranberry treatment is this clafoutis from Yvette Van Boven’s book, Home Made Winter. It works for dessert, or on a brunch buffet.

Finally, I’ve got two Thanksgiving suggestions that don’t involve cranberries, but are so good they require shout-outs. The first is the lentil pate from Kim O’Donnel’s book The Meat Lover’s Meatless Celebrations. It hits all the flavor notes that a batch chopped liver does, but without necessitating that you actually deal with liver.

The second suggestion is the sweet potato puree that I wrote about for Table Matters two years ago. The recipe is adapted from one that Heidi Swanson posted back in 2006 and has been a favorite of mine since I first spotted it.

Related Posts:

Pear Cranberry Jam

Giveaway: Preserving Book Bundle

Friends, so many good preserving books came out in the last year. Truly, I feel like we’re in a golden age for jams, pickles, chutneys, ferments, and even low acid home canning. For this week’s giveaway, I have a short stack of recent preserving releases that would be a fantastic addition to any DIY library.

Now, just to be clear, this is not my definitive list of the best preserving books to hit the shelves this year. I just happen to have extra copies of all three of these books (thanks to the publishers who helped bring these works into the world) and thought it would be nice to bundle them up and give them away to one of my readers.

First up in the giveaway stack is Karen Solomon’s excellent book, Asian Pickles. I wrote a bit about this book last June and the longer I have it in my collection, the more I love it. Truly, anyone who wants to expand their understanding of home picking should pick up a copy post haste.

Next is Fermented Vegetables, which has been out just over a month now. Written by Kirsten and Christopher Shockey, this book is one of the most comprehensive and user-friendly books on fermentation that I’ve seen recently. The pictures are beautiful and lend additional clarity to step-by-step recipes that might otherwise be troublesome.

Last month, I used their recipe for brined dilly beans and I was so pleased by the results that I started entertaining the idea of getting myself a mini-fridge so that I could make more.

Last in the stack is Cathy Barrow’s much-anticipated book, Mrs. Wheelbarrow’s Practical Pantry. This is such an amazing book for home cooks who want to start building up a pantry filled with homemade staples. Sure, it has plenty of boiling water bath recipes, but it also deals with pressure canning, charcuterie, basic home dairy, and smoking. Anyone who likes a food project should have this one on their shelf.

There will be just one winner in this giveaway, who will receive a box with these three books in them. Here’s how to enter the giveaway.

Leave a comment on this post and share your favorite food preservation resource. It can be a website, book, online video, or person. Share the love so that we can all expand our knowledge.
Comments will close at 11:59 pm east coast time on Saturday, November 29, 2014. The winner will be chosen at random and will be posted to the blog by Sunday, November 30, 2014.
Giveaway is open to all.
One comment per person, please. Entries must be left on the blog, I cannot accept submissions via email.

Disclosure: All three of these books were received as review copies. No one paid me to say nice things about them. Additionally, Karen and Cathy are both friends of mine. However, they did not ask me to run this giveaway or say these things. I do it because I like to share the good stuff with you guys.  

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Can It, Bottle It, Smoke It + Giveaway
Jam It, Pickle It, Cure It by Karen Solomon
Links: Cranberries, Quick Breads, and Winners

Links: Cranberries, Quick Breads, and Winners

Last week was the first seven-day period since March when I didn’t have to drive 60+ miles or do a canning demonstration. It was glorious. Now, don’t get me wrong. I love sharing my excitement around food preservation and getting to meet you guys when I’m out and about. I’ve just also found that in order to maintain my appreciation for this work I do, I need some time off from it on occasion. Now, links!

Pickled fennel with preserved lemon!
Fire cider. Good for what ails you.
On rendering lard at home.
Quick breads speak to me. Apple sage walnut. GF corn muffins.
Spike your coffee with this spiced brown sugar syrup.
Cranberries. Jalapeno jam. Cinnamon cranana jam. Molded in a tin can (blast from the past).
Quince jelly. Quince paste.
Mushroom jam!?!
A preserves in action applesauce tart!
On keeping homemade stock in the fridge for extended periods.
Making piece with short days and cooler temps with enthusiasm and cookies.
Two worthy Kickstarter campaigns! Kefirko (a cool kefir strainer kit) and Little BIG Books (small but mighty cookbooks from Molly O’Neill).

Big thanks to everyone who took the time to enter last week’s Fermentools giveaway! It was fun to read all about your favorite ferments! The winners are…

#36/Pam
#113/June
#319/Eileen

And stay tuned. I’ll have a couple different fun giveaways coming this week!

Related Posts:

Links: Pickles, Hard Cider, and a Winner
Links: Rose Petal Preserves, Garlic Scape Vinegar, and Winners
Links: Grapefruit, Honey, and Maple + Jar Cozy Winners

Cookbook: A Kitchen in France

It is the season for big, beautiful cookbooks. Once such new entry into the holiday book gift arena is A Kitchen in France. Written by Mimi Thorisson (who is also the face and voice behind the equally lovely blog Manger), this book is beautifully photographed and gracefully designed and is devoted to Thorisson family as they live, eat and explore in the French countryside.

When I first opened a copy of A Kitchen in France, I expected to find a lovely book that would give me the opportunity to escape into world different my own. What I didn’t expect was that the book would also contain a goodly number of recipes that I would want to immediately flag for my own to-make list.

Now that the days are getting downright bone-chilling, I found myself most drawn to the soups, gratins, and stews. Anything to warm us up from the inside out appeals right now. So far, I have the Harvest Soup (page 158), Garlic Soup (page 242), and Beef Cheek Stew (page 261) on my to-make radar. Thank goodness Scott doesn’t ever get tired of eating soup for dinner!

I have cooked one thing from this book so far and it was a winner. When I was down in Austin last month, I made the Butternut Gratin on page 195. I took pictures of a few recipes that sounded good (so that I could try them while traveling without bringing an eight pound book with me). My sister had half of a giant squash in her fridge and some heavy cream in her fridge, so the pieces just fell into place.

This recipe has actually gotten a lot of play on various websites recently, being that it’s the type that would work on a Thanksgiving table. And while that’s true, having now made it for a weeknight dinner (and pared it with turkey burgers and steamed broccoli), I think it’s one that shouldn’t be overlooked for humbler occasions.

Most of the work is in prepping the squash, but if you have a sturdy peeler and a sharp knife, even that goes fairly quickly. I won’t reprint the recipe here, because it’s already so many places on the web (including Food52 and Leite’s Culinaria) When I made it, I used about 3/4 pound more squash than the recipe called for, and topped it with a mild grated cheddar and seasoned bread crumbs out of a cardboard canister.

Even with those humbler ingredients (used because that’s what was available), it was delicious. There were four adults and one pre-schooler eating dinner that night and we didn’t leave a drop leftover.

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Cookbooks: Honey & Oats
Cookbooks: Canning, Pickling, and Freezing with Irma Harding

Urban Preserving: Pear Vanilla Drizzle

There a short list of canning recipes that I think of as my greatest hits. They are the preserves I come back to again and again, and are also the ones about which I’ve gotten the most feedback from readers and friends. This tomato jam is one. The roasted corn salsa in Food in Jars is another. And this time of year, I always make a batch of apple cranberry jam to share for Thanksgiving.

Another recipe that tops the greatest hits list? Pear vanilla jam. It’s a recipe I first made in early 2011 and I’ve since done it so many times that I can produce it entirely from memory. It’s a jam that works equally well on peanut butter toast or as part of a fancy pants cheese plate (try it with Delice de Bourgogne) and is always makes for a welcome hostess gift.

Recently, I’ve been taking a slightly different approach to this jam. I start with just two pounds of pears, cut the proportion of sugar down a hair, and then, when it’s all done cooking, I scrape it into a heat-proof measuring cup and puree the heck out of it with an immersion blender.

What the pureeing does is that it transforms it into a sweet, sticky glaze that retains a bit of the pear’s wonderful graininess. I call it a drizzle, though if the jar has been in the fridge, it can harden slightly past the drizzle point. I’ve taken to spreading micro-thin layers on toasted and buttered whole grain pancakes (I try to keep a stash in the freezer) and really like an afternoon snack that includes rice crackers, goat cheese, and little dabs of this sweet pear goo.

It’s not a flashy preserve, but it’s one of my favorites. Maybe it will become one yours too!

Print
Urban Preserving: Pear Vanilla Drizzle

Ingredients

2 pounds relatively ripe Bartlett, Bosc or Anjou pears
1 1/3 cups granulated sugar
1 vanilla bean, split and scraped
1/2 lemon, juiced

Instructions

Prepare a small boiling water bath canner and three half pint jars.
Core and chop the pears and place them in a low, wide pan. Add the sugar, vanilla bean seeds, and lemon juice.
Place pan over medium-high heat. Bring to a boil and cook, stirring regularly, until the fruit softens and the jam thickens.
You know when a small batch like this is done because you'll be able to pull your spatula through the cooking jam and the space you cleared won't immediately fill up with jam.
When the jam is finished cooking (it shouldn't take more than 18-20 minutes), scrape it into a heat-proof measuring cup. Using an immersion blender, puree until smooth.
Funnel jam into prepared jars. Wipe rims, apply lids and rings, and process in a boiling water bath canner for 10 minutes.
When time is up, remove jars from canner and let them cool on a folded kitchen towel.
When jars are cool enough to handle, check the seals. All sealed jars are shelf stable for up to one year. Any unsealed jars should be refrigerated and used promptly. Schema/Recipe SEO Data Markup by ZipList Recipe Plugin2.6http://foodinjars.com/2014/11/urban-preserving-pear-vanilla-drizzle/


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Urban Preserving: Strawberry Kiwi Jam
Urban Preserving: Pickled Fairy Tale Eggplant
Small Batch Black Velvet Apricot Jam Recipe

Giveaway: Fermentools Starter Kits

Whether you are a dedicated fermenter, or it’s something you’ve just been considering doing, you’re going to like this week’s giveaway. It comes to us from Fermentools, a company that make a fermenting set-up that is designed to make it nearly foolproof to make all manner of brined pickles and preserves.

Their basic kit consists of a pre-drilled lid, rubber gasket, glass weight (that fits perfectly into a wide mouth mason), air lock, and two stoppers for the jar (one has a hole for the air lock and the other is solid).

Fermentools also sells a starter kit that includes all the gear in the basic kit, along with a bag of very finely milled Himalayan salt that dissolves like a dream.

Now, you might wonder why you need a kit like this to ferment. Truly, you can happily make a batch of brined pickles or sauerkraut without anything more than a jar, salt, and vegetables. But if you struggle with fermenting (and I’ve heard from you guys and I know that it’s a challenge for some), using a kit that includes an air lock can help you better control the environment and ensure that it turns out well.

Thanks to Matt at Fermentools, I have three of their starter kits to give away this week. Here’s how to enter.

Leave a comment on this post. Tell me about your favorite ferment. Are you all about the half sour? Or do you have a crock of sauerkraut going as we speak? It doesn’t have to be something you’ve made either, just something you like.
Comments will close at 11:59 pm east coast time on Saturday, November 22, 2014. The winner will be chosen at random and will be posted to the blog by Sunday, November 23, 2014.
Giveaway is open to US residents only (so sorry, further-flung readers).
One comment per person, please. Entries must be left on the blog, I cannot accept submissions via email.

Disclosure: Fermentools is providing the kits for this giveaway. They also provided a set for photography and testing purposes. What’s more, Fermentools is a Food in Jars sponsor, but they did not provide any additional compensation beyond their sponsorship purchase. As always, all thoughts and opinions expressed are entirely mine. 

 

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Giveaway: Mason Tap, Coffee Sock, and BNTO from Cuppow
Giveaway: Quench by Ashley English
Giveaway: A Kitchen Box + Discount Code

Links: Apple Butter, Pear Vodka, and Winners

After nearly two weeks of congestion and exhaustion, the cold fog has finally started to lift. I made some excellent potato soup for dinner late last week, but beyond that, nothing of particular value has come out of my kitchen. I’m trying to clear out an email backlog and finish unpacking from my trip. I have a two pound bag of cranberries in my fridge at the moment, so expect something appropriately seasonal later this week. Now, links.

Apple butter with blackstrap molasses and balsamic vinegar.
Got a glut of applesauce? Here are six ways to use it up.
Pear-infused vodka (Autumn’s pro-tip is to use a nut milk bag instead of a coffee filter to strain out the fruit).
Honey bourbon mustard. Make it for your mustard-loving friends!
Pickled fennel with lemon and ginger.
These whole wheat peanut butter sandies light up the cookie-craving section of my brain.
Perfect flat bread for eating with soup.
Ideas for using up what you put up (I was interviewed for this article).
Squash and honey pie, baked in a barbecue! (And have you seen their new company, Old Blue Raw Honey? It is glorious stuff.)
This Kickstarter campaign is trying to produce handles designed to fit onto all jars. Thoughts?
Looking for ways to transform an old jam jar? Here’s a collection of clever ideas!

A couple weeks back, I hosted a giveaway sponsored by Cuppow. I had five sets of Cuppow lids, BNTO adaptors, CoffeeSocks, and Mason Taps to share with you guys. The winners are:

#148/Jordan
#188/Haley
#231/Krissy V.
#262/Jenny
#271/Ellen

Thanks to everyone who took the time share how they could envision using the Mason Tap in their kitchens. All those creative solutions just prove that it’s a winner of a product!

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Links: Seed Saving, Shrubs, and a Winner
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Preserves in Action: Jam-filled Turnover

Oh friends. So far, this month has been a doozy. Travel and sickness have kept me away from this space and I’ve missed it (and all of you!). Instead of recounting every detail of woe, I’m just going to dive back in and get things started again.

We are entering the season of pies. In my family, pumpkin and apple are traditional for Thanksgiving (it’s just two weeks away!) and are always homemade. From the time I was old enough to help, I’d be right there during pie making time. Sure, I was interested in how the pies came together, but mostly, I wanted first dibs on the leftover crust.

Once the pies were in the oven, my mom would let me roll out all the scraps with my tiny rolling pin, fill them with jam, and bake them off in the toaster oven. I thought my little tarts were the best thing ever.

Fast forward to today, and I still love to fill leftover scraps of pie crust with jam. Any time I find myself with a little extra dough, I rummage through the fridge, looking for an open jar that will serve as filling and make an impromptu hand pie/crostada/tart thingie. If can spare an egg, I’ll whisk up an egg wash and paint it over the top so that it bakes up glossy and burnished.

I’ve included my favorite pie crust recipe here, in case you don’t have one that you love. If you’re on pie duty this holiday season, might I suggest making a couple of batches for the freezer this weekend? It will ease the way when you’re making pies a day or two before Thanksgiving and will bring a jam-filled tart within easy reach.

How do you guys use up your extra pie crust?

Print
Basic Pie Dough Recipe

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons sea salt
2 sticks cold unsalted butter, cut into cubes
1/2 cup ice water

Instructions

Combine the flours, sugar and salt in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse to combine.
Add the cold butter cubes to the bowl and pulse until the butter is incorporated into the flours and largest bits look to be the size of peas.
Then, with the motor running, slowly stream the water into the bowl using the tube. Stop once you’ve added 1/4 cup of water and test the dough by squeezing it. If it sticks together, it’s done. You want it to just barely hold together.
Divide the dough in two and wrap it in plastic wrap or waxed paper. Store in the refrigerator for at least an hour before using. Overnight is fine too. The dough can also be frozen for up to a month.
If you don’t have a food processor, pie dough is still within your grasp.
Combine the flours, sugar and salt in a large bowl and whisk together. Grate very cold butter using a box grater.
When it’s all grated, combine with the flours in the bowl and work together using a pastry blender or your hands. Add water tablespoon by tablespoon until the dough comes together. Divide and store as recommended above.
Schema/Recipe SEO Data Markup by ZipList Recipe Plugin2.6http://foodinjars.com/2014/11/preserves-action-jam-filled-turnover/


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Preserves in Action: Pumpkin Carrot Bread with Pear Vanilla Preserves
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November Sponsors: Cuppow, Spice Ratchet, Fillmore Container, Mrs. Wages, Blue Kitchen Canning, MightyNest, Fermentools, and The Vintage Pearl

It’s the beginning of November and that means that it’s time to dedicate a blog post to the sponsors who help make this site possible. Please do take a moment to read this post and if they offer something that clicks for you, I know they would so appreciate your business.

First up is jar accessory maker Cuppow! They are the creator of the original mason jar travel mug topper and the BNTO, a small plastic cup that transforms a canning jar into a snack or lunch box.

Next up is Spice Ratchet. They make the blossom trivet that I use as a canning rack, and just recently, they released a line of silicone Blossom uCaps for mason jars. They are available as a storage cap, a sipping cap, and a flower frog.

Our friends at Fillmore Container are back as well. They sell all manner of canning jars and lids, as well as a handful of books and jar accessories. They’re a family-owned business based in Lancaster, PA and they happily work with home canners and commercial producers alike. Make sure to check out all the fun programming they’ve lined up for their booth in the Pennsylvania Farm Show in January.

Mrs. Wages is also back for another month of canning goodness! I’ve written for them for the last three summers and this year, we’re teaming up for an official partnership. They make all sorts of pectins and canning mixes. Make sure to sign up for their newsletter for monthly installments of canning goodness.

Blue Kitchen Canning is up next. They’re an online shop that sells all manner of canning gear. If you’re in the market for a new canning pot or you want to invest in a pressure canner, make sure to check them out!

Our friends at MightyNest are back for November as well. They are an amazing resource for non-toxic, natural, and organic products for homes and families and recently added my beloved 4th Burner Pot to their stock.

New to the sponsorship list is Fermentools. They make a brilliant fermentation starter kit that involves a heavy-duty glass pickling weight, an airlock, a lid with a reusable rubber seal, and mineral-rich salt. I’ll have a giveaway from them later in the month, so stay tuned!

Last on the list is The Vintage Pearl. They make beautiful, hand stamped jewelry and are offering all Food in Jars readers $15 off a purchase of $75. Just use the code “FIJ15.”

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October Sponsors: Cuppow, Felix Doolittle, Spice Ratchet, Fillmore Container, Orchard Road, and Mrs. Wages
July Sponsors: Cuppow, Fillmore Container, MightyNest, Mrs. Wages, & Preserving Now
November Sponsors: Cuppow, Fillmore Container, Eat Boutique, Preserving Now, and The Clay Studio