I love cookbooks. In the days before the internet, I thought I was the only one who read them cover to cover for fun. I’m a genius (if I say so myself) at looking at recipes and telling you if they’re good or not.
I picked up this cookbook
It’s written for a very specific audience—dudes—and uses “man talk” like “squish” and “slather,” “slop” and “drop,” and “dribble” and “chug.”
Great recipes.
Simple instructions.
Fun to read.
Sold.
And doesn’t that combination work for all of us?
No CommentsI took a canning, preserving and freezing class with Edible Columbus the other week. Learning to can was something on my bucket list
I’ve wanted to learn to can since 1981 when I had a week’s worth of fabulous meals from a humble little home kitchen in southern Georgia. Each night we ate a dizzying array of pantry goods like butter beans, corn, green beans and tomatoes. I couldn’t wrap my brain around the fact that these out-of-the-jar vegetables could taste so fresh-picked. (BTW, any of those meals is my choice for my last meal if I’m ever on death row.)
So why did it take me 29 years to learn how to can?
Fear.
Fear of poisoning my friends and family. Fear of trying something new. Fear of being abominable at it.
29 years of fear. 29 summer gardens passing me by. 29 years of tossing the neighbor’s treasure trove of tomatoes and lying that I enjoyed ‘em.
Then, after just one 90-minute preserving, canning and freezing class, all of that fear was GONE.
Whoosh.
Vanished.
Vamooshed.
Three days after the class, with the help of this companion
Ain’t she beautiful??
I gave one jar to my sister. I put one in my pantry. And I put one in my fridge.
A few days after that I tasted it. Scrumptious. And I lived to tell the story. (Trying to pry that lid off was no easy feat. Lemme tell you that I got a great seal on that sucker!)
My fear was canning. What’s yours? What step can you take to overcome it? Mine was signing up for a class. Then buying the jars
Little steps, accomplished one at a time allowed me to relish (hehe, get it, relish? chutney?) the taste of victory. I overcame my fear, learned a new skill and spent a few hours in my joy — cooking.
And I didn’t poison anyone. Though come to think of it, I haven’t heard from my sister in a few days …
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