Consider the Pantry

It is possible to make jam from dreams. Just add fruit and sugar. -Stanislaw Jerzy Lec

Category Archives: Blog

Gettin’ figgy with it

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Montreal in winter: everything fades to gray and white, the earth sits frozen under a blanket of slush and ice, and leafless tree branches shiver in an unforgiving wind that adds the dreaded “wind chill factor,” making minus five feel like minus 18. So, as you can well imagine, fresh local produce is non-existent and [...]

Easing in to 2010

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Woah. It’s the future already. How did that happen? I’ve been slow to get moving in this very snowy New Year. But I have some dried fig jam up my sleeve (not literally – eew) so I shall be boasting and posting as soon as that is jarred.
In the meantime, enjoy the above picture my [...]

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Have a canned Christmas

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

As is my personal tradition, I have once again left my holiday shopping to the last minute. But with a small family, one brother living in Australia, a Jewish husband who doesn’t much care for the frenzied commercialism of Christmas, my list is thankfully short. I mainly shop at Ten Thousand Villages a few days [...]

Also filed in | Tagged cranberry orange jam, cranberry walnut preserve, Food in Jars, Good Food Channel Christmas canning recipes, handmade spice blends, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingsall's edible Christmas gifts | Comments (0)

Chocolate & pear pair up again

Monday, December 14, 2009

It’s that time of year again, when chocolate invades all aspects of life. There are advent calendars, Hanukkah gelt, chocolatey cookies and boxes of chocolates bestowed as gifts. It’s the season to indulge in overindulgence before January’s resolutions and renewed gym memberships. So let’s get our chocolate on before the season of atonement hits, shall [...]

Also filed in | Tagged chocolate and pear jam, christine ferber Mes Confitures, poires belle helene jam | Comments (6)

Turn the beet around

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

I used to think beets tasted like dirt. But as with many taste sensations classically vilified by children – olives, onions, mushrooms, stinky cheese – I’ve come to love these most intensely purple of vegetables, freaky as they are (some have hairy rat tails, you know).
I lived in Australia for a few years and grew [...]

Also filed in | Tagged beet horseradish cabbage relish, beet relish, pickled beets | Comments (3)

Jar world semi-weekly round-up #3

Sunday, November 29, 2009

* Spicy homemade ale
This isn’t a canning recipe, but: how refreshing does this homemade ginger ale by the blog 30 Bucks a Week look? It appears to be both tasty and highly appropriate for flu season. I love the shot of the drink paired with some [...]

Also filed in | Tagged 30 Bucks a Week blog, Canning Across America, canning's unexpected comeback, Culinate, homemade ginger ale, Portland home preserving classes, Preserve Portland | Comments (2)

It’s all gone pear-shaped

Sunday, November 22, 2009

Behold the Flemish Beauty.
Round these parts we call her Beauté Flamande. She’s an extremely hardy type of pear, which makes her one of the few pears that grows happily in Quebec. I’ve been buying them all fall at the market and recently decided to transform a few into butter.
Here’s what I did: I looked over [...]

Also filed in | Tagged beaute flamande pear butter, beaute flamande pears quebec, caramel pear butter recipe, pear butter recipe, spiced caramel pear butter | Comments (3)

Jar world weekly round-up #2

Sunday, November 15, 2009

* Fleeting nature of food trends: is a pickle backlash around the corner?
This week the New York Observer ran an article titled “The Pickle Posse”. In it the Pickle Freak (a.k.a. blogger Katie Tackett) declares that “pickles are the new cupcakes,” food writer and canner Eugenia [...]

Also filed in | Tagged Doris and Jilly, Eugenia Bone, food trends, New York Observer Pickle Posse, oignons confits, onion jam, Pickle Freak, pickle trend, split pea soup | Comments (3)

Yes, we cran (part deux)

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

OK cran fans, we’re back talking about our flame-coloured, bog-grown friends again. In part one, I gushed enough about the lil’ ruby fruit, so let’s get down to next recipe.
It’s a little something I found in the oldy-but-awesomely-goody New York Times Cookbook edited by venerable food writer Craig Claiborne and published in 1961. I partly [...]

Also filed in | Tagged Craig Claiborne conserve, cranberry toasted walnut, cranberry walnut conserve, New York Times Cookbook 1961 | Comments (1)

Jar world weekly round-up #1

Saturday, November 7, 2009

This is where I introduce you to my new weekly round-up of recent canning-related news and recipes from around the web. Why a round-up? Because the journalist in me loves nothing more than corralling information into run-downs, top-ten-lists, wrap-ups etc. using bullet points and snappy prose. Plus, it’s fun to find out about the latest [...]

Also filed in | Tagged bisphenol a in canned food, canning preserving news, civileats.com, pear butter, pictures and pancakes, simply recipes blog, small measure blog, spicy stout mustard, tigress in a jam | Comments (0)