What are you preserving?

[wabbit955]

made today
a spiced blackberry and apple jam
yellow tomatoe pickle
tomatoe and olive pickle
rose hip syrup on the stove now

[red]

preserving and freezing mad here too

preserving: making apple chutney - 2 types - one thats like mango chutney for curries, the other more traditional for ploughmans etc.

liqueurs - strawberry, blackberry, rumtopf and raspberry

i made strawberry jam earlier and we still have lots of last years jams

tonight, have made pears in brandy syrup and damson and apple cheese

[Christine]

Most of the fruit is in the (specially bought!) freezer waiting for apple time and weather nasty enough to be glad about staying indoors.
Made courgette chutney and have another batch to do - this depends on collecting enough small courgettes so they're still firm all the way through - as it's everyone's favourite.
Also beetroot and apricot chutney
The plum tomatoes aren't ripe yet but I'm looking forward to doing the roast and bottle thing with them when they are.
Incidentally - the freezer is a cheap Proline chest. When I unpacked it, I found instructions that say it has to be in an ambient temperature of over 16C. Can you believe it? My house isn't above that during the winter. I thought the upright freezer (min 10C) was bad enough.

[Christine]

Ive been roasting tons of toms with garlic and basil for puree,

Pat - do you skin the toms at all?

[Millymollymandy]

Most of the fruit is in the (specially bought!) freezer waiting for apple time and weather nasty enough to be glad about staying indoors.
Made courgette chutney and have another batch to do - this depends on collecting enough small courgettes so they're still firm all the way through - as it's everyone's favourite.
Also beetroot and apricot chutney
The plum tomatoes aren't ripe yet but I'm looking forward to doing the roast and bottle thing with them when they are.
Incidentally - the freezer is a cheap Proline chest. When I unpacked it, I found instructions that say it has to be in an ambient temperature of over 16C. Can you believe it? My house isn't above that during the winter. I thought the upright freezer (min 10C) was bad enough.

Both my freezers are in my cellar cum mud room which gets down as low as +3C in winter. They work fine!

[Zech]

the freezer is a cheap Proline chest. When I unpacked it, I found instructions that say it has to be in an ambient temperature of over 16C. Can you believe it? My house isn't above that during the winter. I thought the upright freezer (min 10C) was bad enough.

I bought a freezer recently and while researching which to buy, I came across this as well. Apparently there actually is a problem with fridge-freezers, because they only have one switch between them. When the temperature's cool, the whole thing switches off because the fridge isn't needed, so the freezer thaws.

Having made a few payouts for this, manufacturers got around the problem by stating minimum ambient temperatures (what? Fix the problem? Don't be silly!) For some reason, they put these on everything, not just the affected products. As far as I can tell, freezers without fridges are absolutely fine in low ambient temperatures. At least, I hope they are!

[boboff]

They work on heat exchangers, so if ambient is less than the internal box temp, they will not work, fridge, or freezer or combined.

It's not a biggy really, fridge needs to be either turned off or in a warmer place than say 2c, a freezer at -18c will be ok wherever unless it's that cold, you would really want to just turn it off for a while.

[wabbit955]

must finish off the elderberry syrup tonight
and rack me apricot wine

[Millymollymandy]

the freezer is a cheap Proline chest. When I unpacked it, I found instructions that say it has to be in an ambient temperature of over 16C. Can you believe it? My house isn't above that during the winter. I thought the upright freezer (min 10C) was bad enough.

I bought a freezer recently and while researching which to buy, I came across this as well. Apparently there actually is a problem with fridge-freezers, because they only have one switch between them. When the temperature's cool, the whole thing switches off because the fridge isn't needed, so the freezer thaws.

Having made a few payouts for this, manufacturers got around the problem by stating minimum ambient temperatures (what? Fix the problem? Don't be silly!) For some reason, they put these on everything, not just the affected products. As far as I can tell, freezers without fridges are absolutely fine in low ambient temperatures. At least, I hope they are!

This is what I have heard too, and makes sense as one time I had a spare fridge/freezer when I was living in London and it was put out in a covered outdoor area, open on 2 sides to outside! One or the other of the fridge/freezer didn't work properly and we couldn't puzzle it out - fathomed out this mystery years later!

Mine are all just either freezers or fridges and they work fine - apart from the little freezer box inside the top of my tall fridge, which defrosts itself when it's cold in the room - but I don't use it anyway so it doesn't matter. The freezers do work and the temps on the gauge stay exactly the same never mind whether the room is + 25C or + 3C, and I don't adjust any settings.

[wulf]

I've been experimenting with fruit cheeses. The first batch came out like toffee - too much sugar and letting it boil too long, I think. However, my second attempt (apple and tomato, detailed notes on my blog) came out much more like what I expected. Of course, I now have to wait a month for it to mature before I can really judge the success or failure of the method.

I'm definitely on a preserving kick this year and have tried various other things, too. We bought our house in mid-2010 and put a polytunnel up last autumn, so we're bringing in our first big harvest from this garden, as well as donations of apples and pears from friends and various bits of local foraging now we've scouted out some nearby places to look.

Wulf

[grahamhobbs]

With our glut of peaches, the OH has made some peach leather yesterday. Looking forward to a taste tonight.

[Bristolbelle]

I started jam making for the first time, and now I've caught the preserve making bug
Strawberry jam, Raspberry jam, Rose hip Syrup, Plum Chutney, Plum and Blackberry jam, Elderberry Cordial, Sloe Gin and what seems to be a very active Elderberry Wine. Just trying out small batches at a time to test out on the Hubbie and children and then if they like it I'm going to make Christmas hampers for gifts this year. Does anyone have a good recipe for ginger beer?

[Christine]

Thanks for all the reassurance about the freezer - what a relief! Both mine are in the cellar, which rarely drops below 10C and just got down to 7C in that really cold spell last winter. I'd envisaged having to empty and turn off the chest freezer when the temperature drops, which might not be hugely convenient if I haven't got round to all the jam and chutney processing. Also, I want to freeze loads of beans and courgettes this year (if you blanche small courgettes whole and then chop and freeze, they stay together well enough for stews and casseroles)

[Christine]

I forgot to mention the pear and lemon chutney - someone gave me about three pounds of small hard pears, which stay nicely in firm pieces when cooked. I recommend this combination - with some stem ginger (well, I wash the sugar off crystallised ginger, which is a lot cheaper).
second batch of Courgetter chutney bubbling on the stove at this moment - rather an odd smell to it this time, which I can't explain...

[boboff]

Been busy today, 97 jars in total

Blackcurrant Jam
Apple Sauce
Curried Apple Chutney
& my new creation I have called Pretty Pickle, its the runner bean, yellow Courgette, apple & nasturtium flower pickle, with fresh Dill and Thyme... Not sure but it certainly looks great.