It is stunning to me how much the world of information around canning, preserving and DIY food arts has expanded in the last couple of years. When I first started this blog in early 2009, it was so easy to be familiar with the canon of books on the topic. I had them all and they took up about 18 inches of space on the bookshelf.
Then suddenly, a new wave of books started to flow onto the market. One of the best of this first round was Karen Solomon’s Jam It, Pickle It, Cure It. It offered instruction on canning, easy home dairy items and a variety of other projects that were universally welcomed by home cooks who wanted slightly more control over their food.
Karen recently published a follow-up volume called Can It, Bottle It, Smoke It that is just as delightful as her first book. It includes a handful traditional preserves, as well as instructions for homemade cereals (cornflakes! puffed rice!), miso, rice milk, smoked nuts and so much more.
For those of you who were intrigued but overwhelmed by Charcutepalooza and its many meaty challenges, you’re going to want to take a peek at the Hunt It section of the book. Karen has included a series of accessible, easy to follow recipes for corned beef, pastrami and hot dogs (as well as instructions for how to transform those hot dogs into corn dogs.
Every time I sit down with this book for more than a few minutes, I start to itch for the kitchen. The urge to cook become irresistible. My apartment has seen her Sesame Rosemary Granola, the Basic Barbecue Sauce and the Pickled Grapes (so good).
Last fall when I was in San Francisco, I got to meet Karen. We were both judges at the Good Food Awards and during a break in the tasting, she bought me a cup of coffee and we shared tales of obsessive preserving and cookbook writing. Somehow, that led to a request that I write a blurb for the book’s back cover. Entirely flattered, I was thrilled to do it.
All that said, here’s the point I really want to make. Even if I’d never known the first book, never met Karen and never spent hours pouring over a xeroxed galley copy trying to concisely say why I thought it was so good, I would still like this book. The recipes are super solid. The head notes are full of personality. And the pictures are pretty. It’s definitely a buy it, use it, love it book.
What a cool looking book. I’ve been thinking of making more things from scratch like chicken stock and even tortillas, but the thing that I really want to try (or two that is) is yogurt and mozarella. It just fascinates me that people make them from scratch, and I even saw one woman make yogurt in her crock pot! I’m totally trying that.
I loved her first book as well! Can’t wait to take a peek at this one. My husband is an avid hunter so it should come in handy! I just finished up canning Dilly Beans this morning — made from green beans in my mom’s garden. Next up is some pesto from basil that I picked.
I am just learning how to can. So my kitchen project is to can the tomatoes from my garden and to make some jam.
I just bought a case of peaches. My goal is to put them all up one way or another 🙂
I think this will have to be added to my wishlist… I’ve been wanting to make ketchup for a while so that will probably be my next project 🙂
My kitchen project I want to tackle is to make some hard Spanish chorizo. (and start making my own hard sausages – like Genoa and pepperoni)
With watermelons in the garden, all ripening at the same time, I want to try drying some very thin slices. I have a friend who did this and the dry morsels were so much better than I ever expected. They had good flavor, and just melted on your tongue. That’s my next project.
I so want to try making my own greek yogurt – I love that stuff!
I want to learn to use my pressure canner this year. Thus far I have been too intimidated.
My husband’s grandma makes this amazing pear honey that I need to master so that I can carry it on. Hope I win!
Projects on my list…clean out & reorganize my kitchen & pantry, learn to make yeast bread, and learn to can!
I want to add this book to my growing collection of preserving books…I’m addicted now! My next project is to make your apricot jam recipe, and then it’s into clearing a space in our cellar to put a shelving unit to store all the jams and pickles I been making this year.
I want to try some pear jams, as well as nectarine & pear (have pear butter processing as I type)… I’d also like to try making some pickled veggies this summer…
Barb
I want to make my own sous vide machine using a rolling cooler (the kind you keep sodas in). Then, I want to sous vide items using homemade powdered smoke (to impart a smokey flavor). Maybe I can can them afterward!
I would like to try lemon marmalade as I have a very productive lemon tree in my yard.
Would like to learn to make ricotta, cottage, and soft cheeses and make another batch of jalapeno jelly that uses cranberry juice as the liquid.
My kitchen projects include:
– a peach chutney
– green tomato pickles
– dilly beans
– tomatoes with basil
– tuna in oil and jalapenos
and so far this year I have made:
– mulberry jam
– Traverse City Cherry jam
– blueberry champagne jam
– blueberry grand marnier jam
– cucumber pickles
– mixed pepper pickles
– pickled beets
really getting my blog going & getting in a daily habit of writing on it!
My goal is to finally use my pressure canner for PRESSURE canning, not just hot water bath canning. And to put up some tomatoes for my tomato loving husband this winter.
I’m trying to perfect pizza dough and the tomato sauce to put on it (from my garden’s tomatoes).
My big goal (and fear) is canning tomato sauce…I planted tomatoes in my first-ever garden and am growing a huge crop from the six plants I put in. I will make eggplant tomato caponata (also a new recipe) but will tackle the sauce with a little trepidation. I may break out my pressure canner for that one…
Love your posts and fabulous information!
We recently got a smoker and I’m dying to try smoking a duck with tea!
This book looks awesome!
I’ve been wanting to make homemade tortillas. Yum!
I’m waiting for Montana’s Flathead cherries so I can make my brandied cherries 🙂
I’m looking forward to can green chiles and green chile sauce. Roasting, peeling, and seeding 60lbs of green chiles can take up the whole day, so my canning friend and I are thinking about tackling it together!
I’m still looking forward to trying fruit leathers!
I have been wanting to try making gravlax for some time . . . now I am waiting for a friend of mine to get her annual airdrop of king salmon so that I can give it a shot. The plan is to swap trout that DH caught this spring for salmon, so everyone should be happy!
I’ve been wanting to make my own sauerkraut for so long!
We’re waiting for the big tomato harvest to come in to can tomatoes like crazy
I want to make shelves in my kitchen for my spices.
That book looks fantastic! I’ve been wanting to tackle a completely homemade sourdough starter. I actually started one when it was cooler but it didn’t survive long. I can’t wait to try again and actually make some bread from it!
mmmm, smoke. I have always wanted to try smoking foods
It’s more a matter of which thing on my very long list am I dying to make first. I’m just waiting for more cucumbers from my garden so I can make pickles, then when it gets colder I want to try my hand at beef stock. I hope that book is as good as it looks.
I truly need this book and others like it for survival.
I just got a pressure canner – I must admit I am a little nervous after growing up with tales of exploding pot roasts and other stories of ’70s cookery gone horribly wrong! But- I plan on making BBQ sauce when (if) my tomatoes finally ripen and to can beets without pickling them this year.
i want to try making catsup
This book looks AMAZING! It’s always so nice to see how far food photography has come, not to mention preserving in general.
I have been wanting to try my hand at making flavored liqueurs and oils, but I am moving soon and don’t really want to move more stuff. Sigh. Soon I will do it. Maybe it will be a good winter project.
Well I’m still trying to successfully bake a good loaf of bread. Mine are so dense and non-fluffy! I’ve tried new yeast, kneading more, kneading less, adding gluten, etc etc
My next kitchen project is canning…it is that time of year when soon tomatoes will be going like crazy (or so I pray) and I’ll be canning those, more pickles, zucchini relish,and some of our other staples to make it through to next year. I just can’t open that last jar of tomatoes until I KNOW that I’ll be filling hundreds of jars of things again 🙂 So far it has only been a couple of dozen!
Thanks for the giveaway,
Heather
I would love to win this book. The first things I ever canned were my grandmother’s mint jelly and her brandied peaches. I remember sitting at the kitchen table on a hot summer night peeling a bushel of peaches with my grandfather, while my grandmother processed jar after jar. When they get ripe too fast you had better get to work , no matter what time it is!!
I really want to get into dehydrating fruits and vegetables….one of these days I will break down and buy a dehydrator!
Projects! Mine include organizing my canning jars so I’ll actually know how many of what sizes I have, learning to make cheese, and trying to dehydrate some fruits and veggies. Wish us all luck on our various projects!
I need a push to start canning. My mom used to make jam every summer. We would get fresh berries in the morning, she would make pie that day and start jam early the next morning. Homemade jam is so much better that store bought. Jam and tomatoes would be a good start for me!
Such a lovely memory you have Deb! I hope to have a daughter someday who will be able to repeat your words to some or the same variation.
The kitchen project that needs to be done is finish labeling and storing all of the jars put up so far. Dream project? Master my fear of pressure canning. But for today it is get my peach jelly done and figure out what I am doing with all of the tomatoes that were given to me this morning using produce and pantry items on hand. Since the goal is to not spend any more money until pay day.
What a great book! Would love to tackle a few new projects in the kitchen.
Cheesemaking! I plan to tackle it this fall.
I’m a Wisconsin transplant in Vermont (2 great cheese places), so I’ve been dying to make some of my own. I’m also thinking of making some butter and yogurt—basically anything dairy!
Looks like another great book! Over the next few weeks I should be filling the freezer with salmon I’ve caught here in Puget Sound – time to make more gravlax!
After successfully making yogurt (in a slow cooker!), I have found myself more interested in things that involve culturing: sourdough, cheese…kombucha? I’ve never successfully kept a sourdough starter alive for more than few months, but I had an equally abysmal record with plants and this summer my potted garden’s going strong. So maybe the time is ripe.
I am working on our family being as self sufficient as possible. I adore canning and preserving and need as many ideas as possible….this would open up alot of jars for me!
I really want this book. It’s right up my allwy. I recently made gravlax, which was amazing. I’d like to make corned beef and pastrami and sausage.
I am trying to find a good bread recipe that I can use everyday for sandwiches and such. I have only tried a few recipes as it is too hot to bake as much as I’d like right now.
I am waiting patiently on my garden, I regularly make homemade pizza and spaghetti. I really would like to can my own sauces! Also, putting up the vegetables from the garden for the winter! There are just so many things I would LOVE to do/know how to do!! I would love to be completely self sufficient one day. Thanks for the chance to be a part of this giveaway.
I want to make something with fresh apricots.
Gearing up for my holiday gift canning. My pickled peppers are a given, everyone’s fav. I always come up with a jam to give alongside. Last year was bourbon peach, a huge hit. What to make this year? The possibilities are endless!
I want to make something with fresh apricots that now are in season.
Believe it or not, CANNING! We recently bought the Ball, complete book of HOME PRESERVING, and can’t wait to get our other needed supplies to begin!
I need to whip up some fig jam once the season is upon us!
Fantastic giveaway. I LOVE her first book. I’m actually hoping to make a few things from her book in the next few weeks. I really want to try her crackers
I’m starting to drown in homegrown tomatoes. I’m eating fresh at every meal and have enough of your Tomato Jam to last for a year. (Love, love, love it.) So my big project to to can plain tomato sause and crushed tomatoes.
I want to can Tuna this year!! I have some friends that gave us some of theirs and the taste was amazing!
I would like to try fruit in a syrup. I haven’t tried it yet because I am not sure what I would do with the fruit and it just seems strange to me. I chickened out and made cherry bounce instead of putting the cherries in a syrup. I am going to try fruit leather soon:) I can’t wait for your book to come out. I have had great luck with all of your blog recipes-thanks for sharing.
I am new to all of this, so i am looking forward to canning my own food, especially jams and pickles!
I’ve wanted to make my own roasted red peppers and can them. I’m the only one in the house who likes them, so why not have them made just the way I like? Perhaps next week…
PS. I have her first book and LOVE it. The Peanut-Butter Cups are divine.
I’ve been dying to make homemade hard cider. I even bought the cider last year, then didn’t get to it before my husband drank it. This year I’m expecting during apple season, so there will be no hard cider for me. But… someday!
I try to make everything at home, but cereal is one of those things that I still buy in the package. I’d love to make this at home also!
My goal this year is to overcome my fear of pressure canning! I can still remember green beans raining from the kitchen ceiling.
My next kitchen project is to make/can my own hot beer mustard! I’m super new to canning/preserving, so I’ve got an ever-growing list of stuff to tackle!
I love seeing creative things. I especially look for recipes that use ingredients that I like but a lot of folks don’ts….so different recipes aren’t so easy to find i.e pickled okra! Figs! And I experience other places with books….visual too…love to look at food pictures etc. This book looks interesting!
I want to can oodles of tomato-based things this year…but my tomato plants look so very sad, so I need to be on the prowl for decently priced tomatoes.
I have soo many make my own mayo, ketchup, mustard and other condiments. Finish cleaning out the top cabinet so I can put other dishes we don’t use as much. Hose down the highchair-give a really good wash/scrub. Clean and mop the floor. Throw out old spices and replace with new whole seeds-get a spice grinder. Make some homemade applesauce one batch cinnamon the other unsweetened regular.
The newest additions to my growing list of new projects include trying to make soft cheeses and finding a pressure canner in order to learn how to pressure can soups for the wintertime. In the mean time, I’m waiting for my tomatoes to ripen so I can make salsa and sauce to can for the first time. I’m trying to create a pantry stocked with as many fruits and veggies I can figure out how to preserve so that I can not buy them all winter.
This book might be able to help me with my latest pipedream. You’ve heard of, and love, sun-dried tomatoes. How about smoked-dried tomatoes! You know you wanna!
I was inspired by your post about the roasted tomatoes, and a conveniently timed sale on tomatoes. I’m pretty excited to get started once I clean up breakfast today!
For a project, I’ve been wanting to paint our kitchen since we moved into our house 6 years ago. As far as cooking, I’ve got tons of berries in the freezer waiting to be made into jam.
What a delicious-looking book! My most neglected kitchen project is that I need to organize and find a better place for my herbs and spices. Right now they live on the counter, in no particular order. I’ve also need to get back to baking pie – last summer I was on a mission to learn to make pie, and I got better, but I still haven’t perfected it.
Oh, our CSA farmer says we’ll be getting many pounds of tomatoes this week. I’m looking forward to making my first sauce of the year!
I do a lot of pulled pork and ribs with my homemade Peach Chipotle BBQ Sauce. Whenever I do competitions with these items, people tell me how much they like my sauce and ask where they can buy it. Well, they can’t, because it is homemade in small batches as of now.
However, I’ve been officially unemployed for 2 years, and my unemployment, and retirement, has run out. It seems like canning and selling the sauce, makes sense.
I have never been a canner, so I have a lot to learn. But I’m smart, and motivated, so this book would be useful.
I’d also love to learn the material in the “Hunt It” secion you mentioned. I’m sure doing my own basic charcuterie would at least save me money, and could be profitable.
I’d love to win this book.
Thanks,
Brian
I’ve been dying to make house-cured pancetta!
I really need to reorganize my cabinets. And make blackberry jam for all the teachers this year.
I am planning on peach preserves, sliced peaches in light syrup, and peach fruit leather tomorrow! 🙂 I can’t WAIT until the first apples of the season come out – then I’ll be putting up applesauce, apple pie filling, dried apple rings, and apple fruit leather. I’ve got four quarts of my grandmother’s pickle recipe done already, and I am thinking I may do a plum jam at some point too 🙂 Oh! And roasted heirloom roma tomatoes! I need to find time and money to put up at LEAST 10 – 12 quarts of those…
My project plans involve installing some pull-out trays in my lower cupboards so I can better organize my supplies. Once that is done and items get consolidated, I can stop exiling my beautiful jars of pickles and jams and bring them into the kitchen where I’ll remember to use them on a more regular basis.
This summer I did finally make some sundried tomatoes and I’m proud of getting that accomplished. I currently have an abundance of yellow squash and will tackle relish this weekend. Yummy …
My next project is stocking my pantry so we will have something for in the “lean” times. I am looking forward to making apple butter this fall!
I find that my TRUE love in the kitchen is experimenting with new and unusual recipes. I may not be the best cook but I can follow directions! I haven’t had much luck with making crispy pickles so I would like to try some pickling recipes as well as anything meaty or saucey that I can “can”. It seems that I have way too many EMPTY jars floating around. Time to fill ’em up!
My kitchen projects are a little challenging right now as we just bought our first house this summer and my kitchen is still a bit torn up. However, I am still trying to put up as much as possible this year, at least tomatoes and tomato products. I bought a bushel of tomatoes for $15 dollars last summer. The amount of food and the number of meals I made with them in the past year was amazing. I just can’t go without them this year. This is only my second year canning so I’d really like to do more stuff and a wider variety of items this time around.
a kitchen project I’ve been wanting to tackle? I’d love to make some strawberry lemonade concentrate (just saw the recipe in the Ball canning book & I know my friends would love it as a gift).
It is almost time to start the flavored vinegars for Christmas give aways. I would love to tackle a hot sauce for the non-salad eaters among our friends too. And my shelf absolutely needs this new cookbook.
I freeze and dehydrate a lot of stuff from our garden but I’ve been wanting to learn how to preserve by canning! I have yet to take the time to figure it out and I know it’s probably pretty easy.
I’m new to canning, but I’d love to make some different kinds of pickles, one of my favorite snacks
I’m dying to make some good confit d’onion…I’m a huge onion fan and have been wanting to do that for a while. yumm
I would love to win this book, my 5 year old and I are learning how to can. I think this book would be a great help to us, & to share our lovly “makings” with our family. <3
Home-made pastrami??? I would *love* to take that project on!
I am suddenly longing for fall kitchen projects, like making gallons of applesauce like I do each year. Also, I should REALLY tile the top of the island so that it’s no longer covered by a thin, grubby piece of plywood!
I am dying to tackle a salsa canning project this summer. I have never canned tomatoes and am excited to try…. if only the tomatoes would ripen in this cold NW summer…
My project I need to tackle is green beans! I’m getting ready to can a 5 gallon bucket full.
My daughter has about a acre of blackberries so im looking to make whatever i can with them ,blackberry cobbler ant then jams and whatever else i can find to do with them
I would love to try her recipes!
This book looks inspiring! I have never made pasta, but this fall I want to pick up a pasta maker and learn the craft.
Well, that pressure canner has been giving me the evil eye – soon I shall have to take it off the shelf, ignore my fears, and go for it!
I did try the dehydrated watermelon the other day. Oh. My. Goodness. So good!!!