Food preservation

So Serenity talks about wanting to preserve food.  The Ragin' Mrs. and I already preserve quite a bit, although we could probably preserve a lot more if we wanted to.  And we probably SHOULD preserve more.  Grow it or get it while it's cheap in the summer, and can it.

"But Dave, why do that when I can go to the store and buy it?  Why can green beans when I can get them fresh, even in January?"

Because of Glow-bull Warming, of course!

The extreme freezing temperatures hit a very broad section of major growing regions in Mexico, from Hermosillo in the north all the way south to Los Mochis and even south of Culiacan. The early reports are still coming in but most are showing losses of crops in the range of 80 to 100%.

Even shade house product was hit by the extremely cold temps. It will take 7-10 days to have a clearer picture from growers and field supervisors, but these growing regions haven’t had cold like this in over a half century.

This time of year, Mexico supplies a significant percent of North America’s row crop vegetables such as green beans, eggplant, cucumbers, squash, peppers, asparagus, and round and roma tomatoes.

Go out, get canning jars, find the Bell Blue Book of food preservation, and stock up during the summer. We just had corn with dinner last night that we had canned back in August, and the smell of it was heavenly.  We can our own tomato sauce.  Hell, we canned chicken that we still need to use.  We can our own chicken stock and pork stock.  Have you seen all the extra crap they put in Chicken stock these days?  YEAST extract?  Why the hell do they need to put yeast extract in chicken stock?  Screw that crap, we'll make our own.  We have a few jars of our home-grown carrots downstairs in the pantry as well.

And I'm thinking that this year's garden is going to be based quite a bit on what we'll be able to can.

And yes, anyone who still believes that Global Warming is going to cook us all is a fucking idiot.  In fact, it's one of those self-identifying traits that make it easy for me to ignore someone.  "WE NEED TO SAVE THE PLANET FROM GLOBAL WARMING!"  Oh we do, do we?  Tell ya what, why don't you go over there and shout that.  The adults are busy insulating the house and preserving food for the wintertime, which seems to be heading further and further south every year.