A friend from work just told me about a recipe he was trying for preserving cherry tomatoes.  What makes the recipe really interesting is that it doesn’t involve freezing, canning, or dehydrating.  While I consider canning and dehydrating essential skills for simplifying your life and learning to become self sufficient.  There are numerous older methods of preserving food that are far less resource intensive.

Cherry Tomatoes Ready for Packing in Oil

• Cherry Tomatoes
• Small Onions
• Cider Vinegar (1.5 Tbsp/pint Jar)
• Basil to Taste
• Oregano to Taste
• Garlic to Taste
• 1/4 tsp / pint jar of Coarse Salt
• Olive Oil
• Canning Jars and Lids

Wash and dry several firm and ripe cherry tomatoes.  Peel some onions.  Into sanitized pint jars place cherry tomatoes and intersperse with onions and herbs.  Fill to 1.5 inches from top of jar.  Sprinkle salt over contents.  Add cider vinegar and then cover with olive oil.  Cover with a sterile lid and store in a cool (50-59 F) location for two to three months.  After this the tomatoes will be ready and keep for up to a year.

I’m not sure exactly what I’m going to do with them in three months, but I might find a use for them.  I’ve got a lot of tomatoes, so I’ll put them to good use.  Some things about this method of preserving concern me.  First is that olive oil is not a self sufficient resource in Michigan.  I’m sure the oil could be used for cooking at the end of the storage, but being an oil there is the risk of rancidity if it is kept too long.  On the plus side the oil that must tag along with the tomatoes would be an excellent addition to rather lean meats like venison or rabbit.

Cherry Tomatoes in Oil

Enjoy and consider putting up a batch of your own.

Chicken breasts were on sale this past week and we enjoy the convenience of canned chicken.  When I started canning meats a few years ago, I canned all the chicken the same way; in a bath of boiling water with a bit of salt added.  I then gradually started adding a few things until I ended up with two types of chicken in the pantry.  The first was my old mainstay of plain chicken, and the second was basically chicken noodle soup without any vegetables or noodles.  We continued canning chicken this way for a long while, but then one day it occurred to me that I could add other things to the jar before I started canning.  The first thing I tried was to add some barbecue sauce.  It worked great and we could have pulled BBQ chicken sandwiches without any prep time.  The next thing I tried was adding taco seasoning to the chicken.  Now we could have chicken tacos and burritos with minimal preparation.  Pretty soon I had about 8 different varieties of chicken canned in the pantry for quick easy meals.

This past week I tried a new recipe.  Chicken Scampi.  Scampi traditionally means shrimp in Italian-American cuisine. Although the actual word for shrimp in Italian is gambero or gamberetto, plural gamberi or gamberetti. Scampi, by itself, is also the name of a preparation of shrimp grilled in garlic butter and white wine, usually served over pasta or rice. However the word scampi has evolved as a style of preparation rather than a dish or lone ingredient, with that preparation being called shrimp scampi.  From this simple idea chicken scampi was born.

I got the recipe itself from the Creative Canning blog.  Cyn has some great recipes and isn’t afraid to share her successes and failures through her blog.  The recipe as Cyn posted it can be found here.  Ever the tinkerer I felt the need to modify it a bit for my family’s taste.

Chicken Scampi

• 8 lbs. of chicken breast, boneless and skinned, cubed in 1″ chunks
• 2 tablespoon butter
• 4 tablespoons minced garlic
• 4 cups Chablis wine

Brown the chicken and garlic in the butter and then add the wine.  Simmer for a few minutes.  Pack the chicken into 6 or 7 pint jars.  Split the juice between the jars.  To each jar add the following:

• 1/2 Tbsp minced garlic
• 1/4 tsp of salt
• 1/8 tsp oregano
• 1/8 tsp basil
• a pinch of red pepper flakes
• 1/8 tsp of coarse black pepper

Cover with boiling water and process the pints for 75 minutes.

You can serve the chicken as it is over pasta or rice with some Mediterranean vegetables, or you can mix the can water with some heavy cream and a thickener like flour and serve over pasta for a dish similar to Alfredo.

A couple of weeks ago when Texas grapefruit was in season I picked up about 40 pounds of it for canning.  I think I paid less than $7.00 for the 40 pounds, making it a pretty good deal for Michigan.  I’m guessing it’s a lot cheaper in roadside stands down south, but with the snow still above the top of the boots up here, it’s not very likely to show up in many road side stands.  You’ve heard me rant about the relativity of local food in previous entries, so just let me leave it at:  I’m fine buying my grapefruit from Texas.  1000 miles away is a lot better than 5,000 miles away in Brazil.  ’nuff said?

Anyway, to keep the Texas grapefruit around and useful until it comes in season this time next year, I wanted to put as much of it up as I could.  The idea of dehydrated grapefruit just didn’t hold the appeal that moist, tangy-sweet grapefruit served ice cold does.  So I decided to can it.  Home canning grapefruit has its ups and its downs, but over all I am very happy with the process.

Preparing the Grapefruit

The most important thing to consider when canning grapefruit is the removal of as much of the white pithy material as possible.  This is what makes grapefruit bitter.  The grapefruit were peeled by hand by the whole family.  This was fun and much better smelling than the onions we dehydrated a few weeks ago.

The next step was to remove the hearts from the membranes.  This was a bit tedious and time consuming.  Unfortunately I had not heard of this easy method of cleaning grapefruit before we canned these up.  Next year we will use this method and probably be willing to put up more because of the speed that the membrane removal goes using the method in this video.

The sectioned and peeled grapefruit is very easy to process.  Being an acidic fruit, you don’t even need to break out the pressure canner.  Simply fill the jars and top with a weak sugar solution leaving 1/2″ head space.  Process quarts for 10 minutes in a water bath canner.  That’s it.

Canned Grapefruit

I find the texture of canned grapefruit to be a little disappointing, but not detrimental.  The flavor is excellent.  I almost prefer it to fresh, but I think this is mainly the ease with which it can be eaten vs. fresh grapefruit.  I also think watermelon that has been cut up into little chunks and de-seeded tastes much better than big slices of watermelon.  The wife has never been very happy with my mother for spoiling me like that.

Once you have the canned grapefruit you can simply eat it.  I like to mix it with other fruit that is in season or stored for an almost fresh fruit salad.  Cubed apple mixes well with it to give the dish a bit of crunch.  Grapes of course are wonderful as are cherries.  One thing I haven’t tried is to add a bit of dried fruit to it and see how the texture feels.  I’m thinking a dish with canned grapefruit, dehydrated strawberries, apples, and some raisins.  Maybe top with a bit of granola for a good breakfast.

You can also turn the canned grapefruit into a juice very quickly or juice it and then use the juice to make a delicious grapefruit jelly.

Grapefruit Jelly

3 Cups grapefruit juice
4 cups sugar
1.75 ounce of  box pectin
3 drops red food color (obviously optional, but improves look)

Add pectin to juice and bring to a boil. Add sugar and bring to a rolling boil for 1 minute. Add food color. Skim and pour into six 6-ounce jars. Skim again and seal.

That’s my adventure with grapefruit from a couple of weeks ago.  Keep workin’ for the simple life!