suggests that the oldest form of preservation was drying. Middle Eastern and Asian cultures as early as 12,000 BC dried their food in the hot sun. Dried foods allowed seafarers to extend the range of their explorations, eventually circumnavigating the globe. Fermentation was discovered accidentally when a few grains of barley were left in the rain. Through fermentation, microorganisms changed (fermented) starch-derived sugars into alcohols. This process had multiple benefits: food was more nutritious, more palatable, and in many cases, produced an alcoholic beverage—nectar of the gods! Curing and pickling both employed substances to change the chemistry of the food being preserved. In the case of pickling, vinegar and other acidic materials were found to provide climates unfriendly to the bacteria responsible for food spoilage, thus extending a food’s usable life. Curing utilized salt, nitrites, and smoke to preserve foods, inhibit the growth of Clostridium botulinium (botulism), and improve the taste and color of the food.
Home food preservation is certainly nothing new. One of the first preservation methods was drying foods in the sun. Dried fruits certainly haven’t lost favor over time.
The same foods that could be preserved by being dried could also be successfully preserved using other methods, such as freezing. Cranberries are a good example of this.
Freezing and cold storage were initially limited by geography. The 1800s brought the discovery of mechanical refrigeration, and eventually Clarence Birdseye perfected quick-freezing. While cold storage would significantly slow down the biological processes that caused the food to spoil and decompose, freezing would stop them altogether.
WHERE CANNING COMES IN
While it seems like an honorable old convention, canning is really the newcomer on the home food-preservation scene. In the 1790s, French confectioner and father of canning Nicolas Appert experimented for nearly fifteen years in an attempt to win an award offered by French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, who needed a practical way to feed his armies. Appert’s efforts were successful: he discovered that applying heat to food in sealed glass bottles helped to prevent food deterioration. Not only did he win Bonaparte’s award, but the House of Appert became the first commercial cannery in the world. While Appert’s methods were widely applied—meat, vegetables, fruit, and milk were processed in glass bottles and, later, tin cans—it wasn’t until Louis Pasteur that we really understood why the heat application helped preserve the food. Pasteur’s discovery of pasteurization in 1864 clarified the relationship between microorganisms, food spoilage, and illness, which we’ll discuss in the next chapter.
REALLY GREEN GREENS: A WORD ABOUT SUSTAINABILITY
It is hard to argue that a venerable institution such as home food preservation—including canning, freezing, perfecting homemade jams and jellies, and the like—could be anything but green and sustainable. A Carnegie Mellon University study reports that 11 percent of the average American’s household food-related greenhouse gas emissions come from the transportation of foods. According to that study, in the United States, food travels an average of 4,000 to 5,000 miles from its source to our table. Certainly, if you are home-canning locally grown produce, you are reducing the environmental impact of transporting produce across the country and around the world in off-seasons.
Think about it: peaches that travel thousands of miles to get to your supermarket are certainly going to be less fresh, flavorful, and nutritious than the peach you just plucked from the tree.
What’s a Locavore?
This new word aptly describes a rapidly growing “species” of human in today’s food-conscious society. Locavores want food that is fresh, healthy, sustainable, and local. No long-distance transportation that compromises the food quality, adds to the cost, and comes with a big carbon footprint. Locavores seek and savor seasonal foods that grow near them.
Canning your food is a great way to take control of what’s in the food that you eat, ensuring that it’s great-tasting and nutritious. You will most likely save a good amount of money in your food budget because you’ll have your own supply of nutritious “convenience” foods. But as you are thinking about where and how you will get the foods that you want to can, don’t forget the locavore’s mantra: think local. It’s true that you can sometimes get great bargains at wholesale food clubs, but think twice before you buy. The food that large wholesale clubs offer is often produced on industrialized farms using conventional growing methods (think pesticides, herbicides, genetically engineered seeds). It’s likely picked before it’s ripe so that it can withstand a long transport and handling time, during which it will have lost a great deal of its nutrients and fresh taste; and if it’s transported over long distances, which such produce often is, distributors will have used a great deal of our energy resources (gas and oil for transport and electricity for refrigeration) to get your bargain produce from farm to store.
There are sustainable alternatives! Obviously, you can grow your own fruits and veggies. If you don’t have adequate garden space where you live, perhaps your community offers garden plots that you can use or rent for a nominal fee during the growing season. Want the fruits of the labor without the actual labor? Join a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) group and share in the bounty of local farmers. Check out local farmers’ markets or farm stands. When produce is in season, you can often get very good prices by speaking directly with the farmer—and, most importantly, you get exceptionally fresh produce!
If you live in an urban area and don’t have the space (or, perhaps, the inclination) to grow your own veggies, many urban neighborhoods have bountiful farmers’ markets you can visit.
Combine gardening with home preservation and you will be living green and saving green, according to knowledgeable (albeit differing) sources. W. Atlee Burpee & Company, the largest seed and garden supply company in the United States, reports that families who garden will see a twenty-five-to-one return on their investment. The National Gardening Association also has positive (though more modest) claims. They state that a $70 investment in a garden will net a $600 harvest.
Of course, you want to be thoughtful about the food that you put into your body and the bodies of those dear to you. While it seems like home food preservation would, by its very nature, be a green, sustainable venture, it’s not always that simple. You need to look beyond the immediacy of your choice—beyond the heart-tugging, high-profile claims of those on the green bandwagon—and look at the entire system of food preservation that you employ. Throughout this book, I will invite you to be thoughtful in your choices and to look at both short-term and long-term implications.
What does it really cost to can, freeze, dry, and so on? Yes, we want to eat locally and maximize the benefits of each growing season, but it’s wise to balance your passion for sustainability by looking at all of the numbers, not just the ones that make the headlines. The cost of running that freezer 24/7 for twelve months a year is significantly more than the cost to can a batch of tomatoes. And that’s only the consumer’s cost of energy. What about the environmental impact of manufacturing the freezer and transporting it from factory to home…or the cost of producing the electricity to run the freezer? The choices can get sticky. Throughout this book, we’ll include tips and tricks for keeping your food preservation wholesome, nutritious, sustainable, and fun! Now that
