"Berry" sorry for the delay

But rest assured, I have not abandoned Yes We'll Can. I have simply been too busy enjoying all the natural delights of summer to log on and whip up a post. But now that the weather is getting cooler, it's time to sit down and summarize our food-preservation efforts of the last few months.

In June, Mom and I invested in some canning equipment. After much searching, we were dismayed to learn that Wal-Mart was the only place where we could find a water bath canner, wide-mouth Ball Jars, and pectin all in the same place. So the startup costs set us back about $80 buckaroos.

Since Michigan berries weren't available yet, and we couldn't wait to can something, we started with local asparagus. We followed the New York Times' recipe to the T, right down to buying all those whole coriander seeds, so it turned out to be a pretty pricey project. Since we only wanted to make a small batch (this was our maiden canning voyage, after all), those four jars of pickled Michigan asparagus came out to something like $8 a pop.

But we were not fazed. By the end of June, we tackled the Great Michigan Strawberry.

Mom, Aunt Elizabeth, Grandma, and my sister Lydia, who doesn't usually dress like an earth-loving art teacher but I suspect did so for the occasion.

Making strawberry jam turned out to be unbelievably simple. Messy, but simple. We did learn, however, that regular pectin jam calls for a sick ratio of sugar to berries (7 cups/5 cups). We felt pretty uneasy when our 5lb bag of sugar ran out within the first hour of canning. But a quick run to the store later (thanks, Dad!) and we had enough low-sugar pectin to finish the job.

Jam looks pretty disgusting until it's in the jars.

While canning, I tried to make sure we stuck to the Department of Agriculture's Guidelines so that we wouldn't eventually poison ourselves when we opened this jam. Turns out our greatest danger in the canning process was the excessive chattiness on behalf of my aunt, mom and grandma. Due to their gossiping and giggling, we nearly forgot to process half the jars, and an entire batch got made without pectin.

But guess what! It was a wonderful day that ended with forty-two shiny jars of homemade jam (and 7 jars of pectin-free "sauce," also delicious). They came out to $1.50 each, including the jars. By nightfall I was so exhausted that I forgot to photograph the finished product—our jam pyramid—but I'm happy to say it looked exactly like the stuff over at Pioneer Woman's blog (which is addictive, be forewarned).

Pickle this!

It was a great thing to wake up today, my last day in Mexico City before heading home to Michigan, to the sound of my roommate sleepily announcing, "Hey. There's a canning thing in the New York Times."

I hurried over to my laptop and found the article online within 20 seconds. I proceeded to devour it and the accompanying slideshow, which walked me step-by-step through the asparagus-pickling process. This article could not have shown up at a better time. It's giving me a renewed sense of determination to learn the canning arts for myself, and for right now, it's making the idea of leaving the produce-paradise of Mexico a lot less hard to swallow.

Wise words: Joining a CSA

When Aunt Elizabeth was here in Mexico a couple weeks ago, we spent a lot of time talking about how life here is different from the U.S. One thing that we both could not shut up about was the local food markets. They are fabulous. My market is so local, in fact, that I only have to walk two blocks to get my hands on fresh tomatoes, onions, almonds, strawberries, bananas, bushels of cilantro, and homemade cheese. It's very affordable—I usually spend about $18 for a week's worth of the above.

One of the snazzier market stalls in Mercado Hidalgo, Guanajuato

People don't tend to think of Mexico as a pioneer in green living, but food markets are one of two huge areas (bus travel is the other) where this country totally trumps the U.S. Fortunately, Elizabeth let me know about a way around the lack of affordable food markets in the States: buying shares in CSAs.

Elizabeth in my living room in Mexico. The fact that her outfit totally matched the decor was a complete and awesome accident!

And now that spring is here, talk of CSA's (Community Supported Agriculture) seems to be everywhere on the internet. My favorite food blogger, Nick at Macheesmo, just posted an informative post about CSAs with lots of good comments from his readers. Since overabundance can be a problem with CSAs (one reader cites an over-active zucchini patch), the way to get the most out of your CSA is to learn how to preserve, preserve, preserve!

Sweet home Chicago

Time for some good news now. I got accepted to a graduate program in Chicago! Even though this won't take place until after a summer of being unemployed and living in my parents' basement, this means wonderful things for our Plan to Can. How could that be, you ask?

1. Come fall, I will be living a relatively short distance (compared to Texas, where I was previously planning to go) from Michigan. This means that I can lug more canned goods to my new home.
2. More excitingly, this means that I can now add a new dimension of food preservation to my summer goals — fruit-freezing!
3. Speaking of freezing, Chicago is famous for being a cold and miserable place in the winter. All the more reason to invite people over for fresh (frozen) blueberry cobbler and baked ziti with locally-grown and canned tomato sauce!
4. Canning is all about reducing food transportation costs, and by extension, our carbon footprint. The closer I live to home/Michigan/the source of our canned delicacies, the less of a hypocrite I will be in touting this philosophy!

Summer of Savings

I am bummed to report that my lead on a summer job just fell through. Apparently no one is hiring right now....?

This is good news, however, for our Plan to Can. First of all, unemployment is an excellent reason to can your own food. Secondly, since I will likely be living in my parents' basement all summer, I will have boatloads of free time to organize this complex operation. I will also lobby my sister to join, since she's the only one who hasn't emailed me her enthusiastic response to this blog (ahem).

Which brings me to my next topic, emailing vs. blogging. Grandma and my Great-Aunt Becky (our newest recruit, see below) have voiced understandable doubts about joining the blogosphere. I agree that it is tricky. So for the meantime, I will post their emailed comments here.

Let's start with Aunt Becky's response* to my Call to Can:

"I'd love to can with you this summer. I could make it to at least one. I have fond memories of Mom canning tomatoes in the summer kitchen behind the trailer and almost as fond memories of helping her squish the tomatoes through a sieve when I was a kid."  

"Even when she wasn't feeling well, a couple of years before she died, she had Dad carry things out so she could do the canning. I think she took great satisfaction in seeing the beautiful jars of red tomato juice lining up on the table. I know I took great satisfaction in eating chili made from her efforts. It took me years to adjust to store bought tomato juice."

-Aunt Becky, Louisville

*Lydia, recall that Aunt Becky lives all the way down in Kentucky, yet she has committed to can.

Hunk of the Harvest

In a typical time-wasting fashion, my late-night canning research has led me to sit through the entire Cookonomics video archive at Harvest Eating, a website dedicated to seasonal cooking and local food. In just one sitting I have learned how to make my own clarified butter and roast garlic till it oozes. On top of that, I have watched an endearing parade of hairstyles and awkward smiles courtesy of the website's founder, Chef Keith Snow (by my calculations a closeted hippie AND Luke Wilson look-alike.)

Luke Wilson (above) will probably be approached to play Chef Keith Snow (left) in the full-length Harvest Eating movie.

We can do it

It's official, ladies! Our plan to can is now available to the world, so we can't back down now. I am sensing that some great things will come of this project. I will learn to can. My mom will remember how to can. Grandma already can can, so she will learn how to blog.

This summer, will sweat our way through the green orchards of Michigan. We will pick, wash, peel, and slice. We will boil, strain, seal, and be very careful to avoid botulism. We will survive the midwestern winter with insanely flavorful pickles and jams. We will break free from the shackles of high fructose corn syrup. We will never eat Smuckers again.