Naturally Sweet Food in Jars is my third cookbook and was published in March 2016. It focuses on preserving with honey, maple, agave, coconut sugar, fruit juice concentrates, and dried fruits. You can find an array of ordering options here.
The idea for this book was initially sparked by this post, as well as the many alternatively sweetened recipes that have come since on this site. The finished book features more than 100 recipes for preserves, as well as a handful of recipes designed to help you use up some of what you’ve put up.
I had two primary goals in mind when I was writing Naturally Sweet. The first was to translate some of my most beloved sugar-sweetened recipes into those that used less refined sweeteners.
The second objective was to create new and novel recipes that would be safe for canning and that featured the various sweeteners in ways that made the most of their unique, individual flavors.
I also wanted to help change the conversation about preserving. So often, people dismiss it because they feel like the products created when you preserve aren’t always the healthiest.
However, by shining a spotlight on alternative sweeteners, I feel like I’ve created a collection of recipes that are able to balance health concerns with issues of safety and shelf stability.
And, as always, the recipes are relatively small batches that don’t require too much of your time and energy.
Tacos! They’re the perfect food.
Birthdays in this house usually involve a trip to a local Indian restaurant. Happy, happy birthday!
Happy Birthday! Happy canning f!
I always have pound cake for my birthday but since it’s on Christmas there is no shortage of goodies around. Happy Birthday to you!
Happy birthday to you! As far as I’m concerned, May is the very best month in which to have a birthday. My husband, our daughter, and I all have birthdays this month. 🙂
My favorite birthday food is birthday cake, made by my terrific in-house baker (my husband).
I don’t really have a favorite food – they’re all good 😉 Happy Birthday, and congrats on your newest book!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY! We always have Chinese take-out to celebrate birthdays. I love sweets, so the birthday cake is my favourite.
In honor of my dad, I will eat his favorite lemon meringue pie.
I like to eat as much chocolate as possible on my birthday and throughout my birthday month!
Happy Birthday Marisa, enjoy your special day! My birthday was a few days ago and my favorite birthday treat is a butter cream frosting and chocolate cake. The richer the better!
Happy Birthday Marisa! My husband just had his birthday and I made him a chocolate bundt cake that was yummy! Chocolate cake and cheesecake are my weaknesses, but I love any homemade dessert for my birthday! I have both of your other preserve cookbooks and I would love to add this to my collection!
Happy Birthday! For my birthday, I want my grandma’s chocolate cake and vanilla ice cream or mint ice cream/chocolate cake ice cream cake.
Happy, Happy Birthday! For my birthday I always want a cake with pink icing! Last years was raspberry and chocolate!
Happy Birthday to the QOCAP (Queen of Cannng and Preserving)! I have two fave foods I love to eat for my birthday or any day. You can’t go wrong with Shrmp prepared in any way, shape, or form and German Chocolate cake is the bomb! Thank you for all of your inspiration.
Happy birthday! My favorite birthday meal is my dad’s meatball subs!
Happy birthday Marissa!
Wishing you a very happy birthday!!!
Happy birthday fellow Taurean, my birthday is tomorrow , and right now a strawberry shortcake is being made by my boyfriend, we will celebrate today and tonite since tomorrow s a work day. Growing up in south philly , my mother would always ask each one of her four daughters what we wanted for our birthday dinner, my request was the same every year, shepherds pie ( ew gross now ) and strawberry shortcake. Yummmm,
Hope your birthday is great, the cake looked awesome !
I love a good classic yellow cake with chocolate buttercream! Happy birthday!!
I’m a day late, but happy birthday, Marisa! Thanks for the giveaway!
Happy birthday, mine is 5/25…I’ve gotta have coconut! Anything coconut!!!
???Happy Birthday ??? I love carrot cake!
Happy Birthday! Mine was last week and we celebrated with key lime pie! Hope yours is great!
Ice cream cake is a must and champagne never hurts either. Love what you are doing! Happy Birthday.
Cake is a must – I’m fond of Orange Creamsicle cake myself.
Happy birthday! My sister and I live in the same city about 250 miles from our parents, so what we eat for our birthdays is always different, but we always make it for each other (:
I like a country breakfast complete with home fries and scrapple (if I’m visiting my folks in Lancaster, PA. Maybe fish & chips for lunch. My mom’s pot roast for dinner, then cream puffs!
Happy Birthday Marisa! Amazingly, we share the same birthday!! I hope yours was great! I got to spend it with friends and family, and they know that anything chocolate makes my day…I got a small chocolate cake and flowers from the husband and a flourless chocolate torte from a good friend.
Happy birthday! My birthday is around Christmastime, so I like a nice holiday tea!
Hope you have a terrific birthday!
Peach pie is my favorite birthday treat.
Happy birthday! How SWEET of you to thank of us with a giveaway! I love to celebrate with my infamous flourless chocolate cake smothered in chocolate ganache! Yum!!!!
Donuts are my kryptonite, but birthdays are a great excuse to indulge. Happy Birthday, Marisa!
Happy birthday! When I was a kid, my mom always made whatever we wanted for dinner. I always picked Chicken ala King. It was a bit of work, so she didn’t make it very often. I still make it myself every year for my birthday in remembrance.
I love a decadent brownie on my birthday!
Happy birthday! I love to eat lemon poppyseed layer cake for my birthday. It’s difficult to pull off as a light, tender layer cake instead of the traditional pound cake but when it works, it is great.
Happy Birthday, mine is on Sunday the 15th. I’m running a marathon to celebrate and will be indulging in my favorite dessert…Dark Chocolate Stout Cake with Chocolate Buttercream, Peanut Butter Buttercream and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.
I like to eat takeout or my mom’s cooking on my birthday. This year we had sushi! I also like to experiment and make a new cake variety. Happy birthday!
Happy birthday! I celebrated on Tuesday, and — though it paled in comparison to my first mother’s day a few days earlier — my sister and I made banana ice cream with caramelized white chocolate from Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams book. That was breaking the mold. The normal birthday treat in our family is Julia Child’s reine de sabaa. Hope you have something as rich (or as chilly, as the case may be)!
As a kid, my absolute favourite meal for my birthday was my mom’s pineapple pork, with a chocolate cream pie for dessert. Now, it’s more likely to be my family’s favourite pulled pork, and my husband’s delicious chocolate tapioca.
Happy Birthday, you amazing person, you!
Happy Birthday! Would love to win!
It is our family tradition to get takeout Chinese for birthdays. This last birthday, I bent it a little and got Vietnamese (and it was delicious)!
Happy Birthday!!! I hope you have an awesome one!! My favorite birthday cake is strawberry shortcake. It must have fresh strawberries and real whipped cream! Yum! Make me so happy! Though I did recently make your whole fruit Meyer lemon marmalade and I think a swirl of that on the cake would be stellar.
Happy birthday enjoy the day
I like to eat German Chocolate Cake on my birthday. The real deal, homemade cake. In fact, I am happy to make it for myself just so I can eat it on my birthday!
Happy birthday to the canning queen! My birthday wouldn’t be the same without my mom’s cherry cheesecake with a graham cracker crust half an inch thick. Now if I only could can it…..
Happy Birthday! I have a May bithday as well. Growing up, I never wanted cake for my birthday but always asked my Mom for pie!
Happy Birthday! I love to eat German chocolate cake on my birthday
I love any home made cake. However when I was in the hospital with our final (3rd) baby my husband let the others pick out a fancy store cake and now that is their tradition. Shopping with daddy for a cartoon cake. I still get to make my own.
Happiest of birthdays to you! My husband makes beef Wellington for family birthdays, it is wonderful and not really that time-consuming. It definitely marks a special occasion.
Happy Birthday & congrats on the book, it’s beautiful! The last few birthdays I’ve made this Strawberry Summer Cake: http://smittenkitchen.com/blog/2011/05/strawberry-summer-cake/
It’s almost more fruit than cake, and the long baking time makes the berries reduce to an intense jam-like state. It’s simple and always delicious. I have tried it with other fruit, but it seems to work best with the strawberries.