Tag: mixer

Grill It, Roast It, Smoke It

On By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Grilling, Topic, WorkshopsLeave a comment

And just like that, September is here. Long before I’m ready for summer to be over, the month that signals the start of fall rolls in. But even though a few of August’s garden-fresh favorites are finished for the season, September’s list of harvestable fruits and vegetables is the longest of year, with the last of the summer beans, berries, and corn bumping up against the first of the fall greens, plums, and winter squash.

If August is the month for enjoying fresh fruit and veg, September is the month for adding a bit of charred, caramelized, and smoky flavor to the produce on the table. We’ll be grilling, roasting, and smoking all month at Twice as Tasty—mostly thanks to some incredible response from recent Twice as Tasty workshops.

Although my September schedule is quickly filling up, it’s not too late to get in on the current lineup or featured workshops locally. And Twice as Tasty will be on the road again in late October! For more details, click here.
Read more about grilling, roasting, and smoking

Fruits of Summer

On By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Canning, Dehydrating, Event, Freezing, TopicLeave a comment

June has me craving garden sweets. Rhubarb has been gracing my table for weeks; now strawberries are reddening to join it. In warmer areas, you’re probably anticipating blackberries, blueberries, and tart cherries before the month is out. As we roll into July, raspberries, apricots, and early plums will all start to appear. It’s hard to resist summer’s sweet bounty.

It’s also hard to overcome the desire for fruit out of season. Although American grocery stores stock nearly every vegetable imaginable all year, some fruits can be harder to come by outside their harvest window. Those that do appear year-round, or close to it, lack that fresh summer flavor that makes them so appealing. How they are grown is also of concern; more than half of the Dirty Dozen list (foods with the worst pesticide residue based on USDA and FDA data) is fruit. These are all good reasons to grow—and save—fruit yourself.
Read more about preserving the fruits of summer

Tomatillos

On By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Canning, Freezing, Grilling, Ingredient, Using2 Comments

If you’re a gardener, you likely end your season with a rack of green tomatoes and a quest to find a way to use them. Sorry, but this is not that recipe. I gave up on green tomato salsas several years ago—the vinegar required to make the salsa shelf stable when water-bath canning has always seemed overpowering.

Instead, I fell for the lovely green lanterns that grow into tomatillos, the traditional base for salsa verde. These little husked fruits clock in at pH 3.83, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, well below the safe level for water-bath canning. The added acid covers the secondary low-acid vegetables and boosts the flavor. Even so, grilling and draining vegetables hasn’t been lab tested by National Center for Home Food Preservation, so I heavily researched and meticulously calculated the acidity for safe canning; to double-check my calculations, I test the recipes with a ThermoWorks high-accuracy pH meter. More details are in the Tips & Tricks for the recipe.

Tomatillos are as easy to grow as tomatoes; just be sure to buy two plants so that they cross-pollinate. Not surprisingly, I prefer them grilled like tomatoes—and have found yet another beverage use for their juice. Learn to make Grilled Tomatillo Salsa and Grilled Tomatillo Margaritas

Tomatoes

On By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Canning, Freezing, Grilling, Ingredient2 Comments

Hopefully you were swayed by my argument for grilling vegetables last month. In this week’s recipes, the grilled flavor shines. The salsa has evolved over the years from fresh to roasted and finally to grilled. We get more compliments for it than for anything else we process, and no matter how much we put up each year, our stash barely lasts to the next canning season.

The grilling creates intense flavor, but it also lets you stretch out the process to suit both your harvest and your schedule. We harvest and grill the ingredients as they come ripe, separating the tomato juice and solids. Then we stash everything in the freezer until we have enough for at least one full canner batch of salsa. It’s also a fabulous recipe for a canning party, particularly when paired with a tasty beverage to celebrate your hard work.
Learn to make Grilled Tomato Chipotle Salsa and Grilled Tomato Bloody Mary Mix

Tart Cherries: Savory

On By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Canning, Event, Giveaway, Grilling, Ingredient, Using5 Comments

Happy Can-It-Forward Day! As a new food blogger, I feel honored to be invited by the Ball brand to make a recipe from The All New Ball Book of Canning and Preserving. One pass through the book, and I had decided what to create for the sixth annual Can-It-Forward Day. Yes, recipes such as Low-Sugar Strawberry–Tequila Agave Jam and Apricot–Lavender Jam caught my eye, but how could I pass up the chance to combine tart cherries, chipotles, cilantro, and tequila—especially when I was midway through the cherry harvest?

We harvested and processed a double batch of this cherry salsa last weekend, and we’ve been sharing it with people all week for feedback. Love for it has been unanimous. The recipe produced a lovely fruit salsa, with plenty of cilantro flavor and a great tart bite. It’s been particularly popular as the accompaniment for our favorite fish tacos. Learn to make Smoky Sour Cherry–Tequila Salsa and Grilled Fish Tacos

Canning My Way

On By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Canning, Topic10 Comments

Canning, jarring, putting up—depending on where you live, one of these terms likely comes to mind when you hear someone talk about preserving food. Once the domain of grandmothers with giant gardens and 4-Hers learning home-ec skills, recent years have seen a shift in the people processing at home. Eugenia Bone released Well-Preserved in 2009, sharing recipes developed in her New York apartment and designed to fill two to six jars at a time. Blogger Marisa McClellan launched Food in Jars, and her success and subsequent books helped popularize small-batch canning. Articles on home canning appeared in the Wall Street Journal and New York Times and on NPR, and Slate declared at-home preserving “ridiculously trendy.” Since then, the number of books, blogs, and people canning at home have only grown.

I love that a rising interest in eating well year-round has led more people to support farmer’s markets and CSAs, make meals from scratch, and save what’s in season for later use. The appeal of small-batch processing is understandable: Take your leftover fruit or veg and seal it in a couple of jars. The argument is that it’s a quick and easy way to preserve food.

The “couple of jars” part is where I disagree. By the time I prep my canning gear and the food item, heat a kettle of water, make a brine or jam, and finally process the batch, I want to pull the maximum number of jars from that kettle. Instead of going small, I recommend going big—at least big enough to maximize your yield while minimizing your effort and sometimes spreading out the work.
Read more about canning my way

Rhubarb

On By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Canning, Ingredient, Refrigerating, Using2 Comments

I grew up in a rhubarb family: large patches growing in my dad’s and grandpa’s gardens, rhubarb pie at Thanksgiving (never diluted with strawberries), and a stash of rhubarb sauce in my mom’s fridge that I put on everything from ice cream to Cheerios. Among the first things I planted when I moved to Montana were rhubarb eyes taken from my dad’s plants; they’ve since spread out into a garden patch that produces all summer long and never bolts—one of the few perks of gardening in the shady woods.

After a winter of playing with various combinations of produce-influenced cocktails that put a splash of summer into the grayest day, I instantly saw “beverage” when I cut my first stalks of rhubarb in spring. The straight rhubarb needed another flavor to balance the bright pink syrup, and I knew from making sorbet that rosemary would add just the right touch in a summer cocktail. Learn to make Rhubarb–Rosemary Syrup and Rhubarb–Orange–Ginger Marmalade