Special thanks to the publisher for providing a review copy of this book.
Book Description:
Preserve your favorite foods with the aplomb of a seasoned expert. Whether you want to freeze five quarts of just-picked berries or have questions about safely canning your tomato-meat sauce, Sherri Brooks Vinton offers reassuring advice to help you put up home-preserved foods that are safe to eat and delicious. A perfect companion to all your preserving recipes, this friendly guide answers your questions and addresses your concerns about refrigerating, freezing, canning, drying, fermenting, and infusing.
About the Author:
Sherri Brooks Vinton is the author of Put ’em Up!, Put ’em Up! Fruit, and The Real Food Revival. Her writing, talks, and hands-on workshops teach how to find, cook, and preserve local, seasonal, farm-friendly food. Her website can be found at www.sherribrooksvinton.com. She lives in Connecticut.
Book Details:
Spiral-bound: 256 pages
Publisher: Storey Publishing, LLC; Spi edition (March 25, 2014)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1612120105
ISBN-13: 978-1612120102
Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 6.4 x 0.9 inches
Retail Price: $16.95
Digital Editions also available
My Thoughts:
Summer is the perfect time for putting up the abundance of produce that is available at farmer’s markets, through your local CSA, from your garden, or even from your grocery store. Costs are usually lower this time of year, so it’s a great time to take advantage of those lower prices to put away food for the rest of the year. Food that is ripe and in-season tastes better and has more nutrients available when it’s picked at its peak.
While I utilize some methods of putting up food, I’m still in the process of learning about other methods. I know how easy it is to put off trying different methods because they seem intimidating. In Put ’em Up! Preserving Answer Book, Sherri Brooks Vinton steps into the world of canning, freezing, drying, fermenting, and making infusions by answering common questions and explaining the ins and outs of these different methods.
For the true beginners and those who need a refresher course, Vinton first covers the basics of food preservation, talks about where to find quality food and how to properly store it, and discusses prep work for the foods. The next section dives into the preserving process which covers general information about canning, water-bath canning (boiling-water method), pressure canning, refrigeration, freezing, drying, fermentation, and finally, infusions. The final section gets into the actual application of the skills talked about in the rest of the book. The topics include answers about sweet and savory spreads, pickles, vegetables, whole fruits, and tomatoes and tomato products.
Put ’em Up! Preserving Answer Book is not a recipe book, but it does include several recipes including:
- Bread and Butter Chips (pickles)
- Pickled Okra
- Green Beans in Water
- Simple Brine
- Pub Pickles
- Dried Cherries
- Classic Fermented Sauerkraut
- Strawberry Vinegar
- Quick Blueberry Jam
- Pan-Roasted Chicken with Raspberry Reduction
- Peel-and-Pip Pectin
- Pickling Spice
- Blueberry Gastrique
- Pears in Honey Syrup
- Avalanche Sauce
For more recipes, you can check out Vinton’s other books: Put ’em Up! and Put ’em Up! Fruit. (Note: I have not personally used either of these books, so I can not vouch for them.) This book is wonderful for someone who is first getting started with food preservation or for someone who needs a refresher course. Its question/answer format is easy to follow. I like the enclosed spiral format is it means the book actually stays open for easier reading and use. It’s a nice resource to have on hand when you want to be able to quickly look up a question about a particular preserving method.
Disclosure: I received this book free from the publisher for this review. A positive review is not required nor guaranteed. All opinions are my own.
