Store It Foods

When fall comes around, I’m the first to venture into the nearby woods in search of a local delicacy. As the leaves take on a faint hint of yellow and orange hue, I know it’s time for the blackberry harvest. The plants flourish in the unique Pacific Northwest climate, and my friends from out of state are always calling me on the phone asking about receiving their annual batch of blackberry jam.

I prefer to make the jam with a couple of quarts of berries – about a quarter of which are unripe, adding a desirable tartness to the condiment. After I’ve washed, milled and preserved the berries, I add a touch of sugar and cook them for approximately one half-hour. Then it’s as simple as setting aside some of the jam for a pie and placing the rest in frozen food storage. If I ration the jam correctly, I’ll end up with an entire year’s worth of tasty bread spread.

When I was very young, my parents would always pester me during dinnertime about finishing all the food on my plate. If I scraped even a few stray peas or wayward lumps of mashed potatoes into the garbage bin, my mother would chide me, saying, “There are people starving in China.” Whether or not that was true, I had difficulty drawing a connection between my negligible waste and others’ misfortune.

As I grew older, I began to appreciate the importance of saving food – both for ethical and economic reasons. These days I prepare enormous meals and end up with plenty of leftovers – prime candidates for frozen food storage. My freezer is stocked with vacuum-sealed bags of practically every entrée known to man. I just hope I’ll get around to eating them some day.