When visiting secondhand bookshops I now head straight to the cookbook section in search of vintage canning and preserving books. Here’s one I unearthed recently: The Complete Book of Preserving by Marye Cameron-Smith, from 1976.

Dig the book’s 70’s-tastic country kitchen look.

Like the kitchens from that era, food photography was steeped in shades of rust, avocado, burnt tangerine and jaundice yellow. Meticulously placed pineapple rings and sliced, pimento-stuffed green olives were the decorative flourishes of choice.

Check out one of my favourite spreads (let’s call it “Still Life with Scuffed Tupperware Tubs and Plastic Bag Chicken in Chest Freezer, Set Against Wood Paneling.” Take a wild guess whether the profession known as “food styling” existed yet.):

There are chapters on fruit syrups and liqueurs, jams and jellies, chutneys, ketchups, pickles, candying and crystallizing, curing, smoking, salting, freezing and more. I bought a giant cauliflower yesterday at the market in order to make the piccalilli recipe. Piccalilli’s a British mustardy-pickly relish. I bought a jar of it two years ago at London’s 300-year-old department store Fortnum & Mason, loved it, and never found any in Montreal. This winter it’ll pair up real nice with Quebec’s contribution to the global pork pie mosaic: tourtière.