So I haven’t really announced to my readers yet that I’m getting ready to make a cross-country trek to a new home. I’m leaving Flagstaff, AZ after so many wonderful years and heading to Evansville, Indiana. I got a new a job there, the cost of living is much lower and I will have a long growing season to spur a quite productive garden. At least that’s my hope anyway! The drive is more than 1500 miles and we obviously can’t take perishable food on the road with us. So we’ve been dwindling down our supplies both in the cupboard and in the freezer. That’s led to some very uninteresting meals but also extremely low grocery bills. I knew we hoarded food for a reason!

Within our stash of food, we had several bags of frozen fruit. Two of those bags were a triple berry mix with raspberries, blueberries and blackberries. The third was a bag of strawberries. I’ve dipped into them on occasion to make one recipe or another but they were mostly unused. Not wanting to waste all those berries or give them away, we decided to whip up some quick batches of no-pectin jam. Pectin is that stuff you buy in the little box at the grocery store that gels up your fruit mix. I didn’t have any to begin with and really didn’t want to waste the gas driving into town for some so I found pectin-free jam recipes online (my canning book was packed away by my very efficient box packer).

My first batch of triple berry jam worked out great. I found a recipe that basically is nothing but 4 cups of fruit and 4 cups of sugar. Boil it until it gets to 220 degrees and then can it in sterilized jars. Pretty simple! But my next batch of strawberry jam wasn’t working out so good. After an hour of rapid boiling I could not get the temperature to climb above 203 degrees. Getting worried I headed to the world wide web to do some SOS searching on what to do. Luckily, I stumbled across Laura and Barb’s blog called My Sisters Kitchen. Their blog post on making jam without any added pectin informed me of a temperature correction formula if you’re above sea level. At 7500 feet, I definitely needed to correct down on a boiling point for my jam!

I quickly rushed back to my kitchen and began putting my strawberry jam into sterilized jars. Those two saved my day! I could have been waiting for strawberries to boil until they absolutely could boil no more and turned into some strange gooey concoction that would have made for a dish washing disaster! Check out their blog. They seem to have a lot of wonderful recipes and life experiences to share. I’m going to add them to my frequent list!

What have you done to avoid wasting food?  Have you found yourself making changes due to rising food prices?  Share your hints and tips with our other readers.  For some time we’ve been using a whole chicken right down to the bones for several meals.  For more on that, read The Art of Resourcefulness.

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We are just 18 days away from the first official day of Spring, the Spring Equinox happening on March 20th this year.  In many parts of the country it seems the veil of Winter has been lifted already and we’re beginning to thaw out.  Is it just a teaser or has Spring really sprung?

If you happen to live in a warm part of the country, you might already be planning your first Spring garden party.  If so, how would you like to make a nifty drink dispenser that not only tastes good but can be composted when you’re done?!  Check out Elizabeth’s Drunken Watermelon on Tap for the super idea and instructions on how to put it together.  I guarantee this one will be a crowd pleaser at your next outdoor get-together.   If you don’t want to make the beverage alcoholic you can of course substitute it with another beverage.  Watermelon punch, lemonade or iced tea anyone?

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I had some fun today and put together a quick mini-movie to enter in El Polo Loco’s latest contest promoting their fresh, citrus marinated, flame-grilled chicken. The idea is that it’s a lot of work to get the same flame-grilled, citrus taste yourself and the results might not be so wonderful. I tried to add a little humor into mine. Watch it below! Head on over to watch the other grilled chicken videos.

[youtube pwehwmTobno El Polo Loco]

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As we move from the Christmas holiday into the New Year, you might be thinking about hostess gifts or party favors to dole out at all those New Year’s parties your headed too. If you’re over baked goods, why not consider whipping up some homemade liqueurs and cordials. I home-brew my own beer and have been happily handing out a pale ale I brewed this summer. Beer and wines require advance planning though, so unless you have some ready to be bottled up, I suggest homemade liqueurs. The tasty and sometimes exotic concoctions you find lining the shelves in the local liquor department can usually be made at home with little effort.

I have about three very old paperback books that are filled to the brim with just about any liqueur recipe you could think of. Any fruit, nut, herb or otherwise worldly flavor can be steeped into just about any neutral spirit. The main player is vodka but there are also recipes dealing with whiskey, brandy and other liquors. Most recipes consist of making a simple syrup to sweeten the liquor and the addition of something to flavor it like vanilla extract, chocolate extract, etc.

Tracking down usable recipes can be a quandary though since homemade liqueurs seem to have been little more than a passing fad during the cocktail heydays of the 1930’s through the ’60s. While there aren’t many liqueur recipes spread about the internet, you can find plenty in a book that’s currently offered called Cordials from Your Kitchen . That should have plenty of recipes for any aspiring homemade-liqueur maker to dabble with. I found my small collection of liqueur making books at used book stores and thrift shops…places you can easily find things several years old that people don’t want anymore. All you have to do is find some nice bottles to dress up your liqueur and you’ve got a great gift to hand out while wishing a prosperous and happy New Year. Below are a couple of great recipes you can try out:

Ginger Honey Liqueur

A spicy, full-bodied liqueur. Try it warmed up on a cold winter night.

• 3 tbs. finely minced, peeled fresh ginger root
• 1 tsp. lemon zest
• 1, 3-inch long cinnamon stick broken into pieces
• 2 whole cloves
• 3 cups brandy
• 3/4 cup honey

Combine ginger root, lemon zest, cinnamon stick, cloves and brandy in a large jar. Stir well to mix ingredients. Cover tightly and let steep in a cool, dark place for 1 week. Shake jar occasionally. When steeping period is complete, strain and filter the liquid. You can use filters found for filtering wine at your local home-brew shop or you can just use a coffee filter. Combine honey with the filtered brandy mixture. Pour into bottles and cap tightly. Let age at least one month before serving. Recipe found in The Village Pantry’s Treasury of Homemade Liqueurs by Janet Reda.

Pear Liqueur

A tasty treat with flavors of the winter season

• 1/2 lb. mature, ripe, firm pears
• 2 apples, peels only (any variety will work, but Red Delicious works good)
• 1 clove
• 1/2″ cinnamon stick or pinch of ground cinnamon
• Pinch of nutmeg
• 2 coriander seeds
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1.5 cups vodka or brandy

Cut the pears into strips (don’t pare) and place in a jar with all the other dry ingredients including sugar and the two apple peels. Add alcohol to cover. Steep two weeks, shaking the jar every two days to mix the ingredients. Strain and filter. A coffee filter works great. If you’d like the liqueur to be sweeter, add simple sugar syrup in small quantities (about 1 oz. to 4 oz. of liqueur) to establish a sweetness ratio. Then add to the whole bottle accordingly. When the recipe tastes perfect and you’ve recorded it in your recipe book, purchase more pears and make larger amounts for cooking, drinking and gift giving. Mature pear liqueur about 2 months. Recipe found Homemade Liqueurs by Donna and Mel Meilach.

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While my yard is blanketed in white, the onset of the gardening catolog season is already beginning to flush our post office box with fun new catalogs. I’ve already spent more than an hour pouring through hundreds of tomato varieties in the Totally Tomatoes catalog that arrived two weeks ago. I probably earmarked about 30 different varieties I’d like to grow but I guess I better think about slimming that list down!

I’ve also spent the morning relishing over a couple of food blogs that do a great job of combining gardening information with some delicious looking recipes. I quickly became a fan of Kalyn’s Kitchen blog and the myriad of healthy recipes she’s concocting and sharing with readers. I also got a lot of great ideas from reading her summer blog post on the bounty growing in her backyard garden and the recipes utilizing it.

I now have food blogs on the brain too. Maybe it’s the delight of eating yourself silly during the holidays that’s got me on the subject. I regularly read Farmgirl Susan’s Rural Food Blog and enjoy every single post. It’s partly because I’m jealous of her life on the farm. She also suggested some great food blogs including Nami-Nami from Estonia, Garlic Breath from France and Lucullian Delights from Italy. I think they’re enough to transport you to another country, if only for a few minutes!

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