A Mommy's Dilemma

I am so bad at updating this blog it's horrible. But now that Simeon is asleep, hopefully for the night...

I've had this blog working in my head since I read this article a few days ago. From the things I've read from Michael Pollan we agree on many things. And in my pre-baby days I lived the lifestyle he promotes. I shopped (and worked) at a farmers market, we ate little processed foods, and I prepared healthy food for us at most meals. I was excited about little Simeon's arrival and looking forward to introducing him to healthy foods.

Well to my dismay I'm so busy caring for my dear baby our meal times have become more processed and less crunchy. Now I love my boy and wouldn't want to be anywhere other than home with him. I'm so blessed to have this opportunity. But I feel guilty for letting our meals become less than ideal. Daniel has been eating out most days for lunch, so I really should be preparing better than average suppers to make up for whatever he's not getting at Subway. However my boy is a hungry one and to give him the best I'm breastfeeding him. So it's not much of a dilemma, I'm going to feed my boy first and then after the laundry and the floors are cleaned (important now that he's a little roly-poly and is picking up Barley's hairball off the floor- blahh!) I may throw together something for us to eat.

Seriously tonight: hotdogs with chili (from a can), tater tots (purchased by Daniel as an effort to reduce the grocery bill- containing scary chemicals to promote browning), and a salad. What has happened to me? I wonder sometimes what happened to the girl that baked whole grain bread for us to eat and cooked a good meal most nights.

I did receive the Julia Child cookbook for Valentines day and have enjoyed reading through it a bit. I even decided that I was going to cook a soup recipe out of it that looked pretty easy, well it's Friday and no sorrel soup yet. I did bake some healthy muffins for us to have for breakfast. I just wish I had more time to do everything I want to do for my family. I know I'm doing what is best for my son, but breastfeeding is pretty time consuming and I want to be supermom and do it all. I try to savor his babyhood, I know there will be time for Julia Child later. I just don't want his childhood memories of food be from a can and box, at least not all of them.

My newest obsession: Julia Child

Why you might ask? Because she's awesome, she cooks with real butter, makes mistakes, and has a unique voice Daniel calls "like Ms. Piggy". It all started when I watched Julie & Julia with my in-laws when Daniel was out of town about a month ago. I loved the movie and wanted to know more about the queen of cooking.

Previously all I knew was she was a really old woman with a cooking show on PBS. Also her cookbooks were very highly esteemed, and were tops for having working recipes. What other type would a cookbook have? Well unfortunately many cookbooks are published with recipes that don't work, ever cooked something that didn't turn out and you really followed the recipe? Well it may not have been your fault. But Julia was always very careful about having cookbooks with very carefully tested recipes.

I don't have her classic Mastering the Art of French Cooking yet. I'm hoping my Valentine might give me the set in hopes I'll make him a yummy meal.

Why in the world would I be interested in some from scratch, possibly complicated recipes now? Because I love to cook. Some of my favorite pre-Simeon times were making delicious meals for my hard working husband to come home to. And I will have the opportunity to teach Simeon about food in the years to come. Being we are home together all day and we don't have a TV, we'll need some activities. Seriously the boy is really active and is going to need some constructive outlets.

Successful Spelt Substitution

Once again I have stolen a picture from the internet. By the time Simeon was taken care of and breakfast was done we weren't waiting for photo shoots! This is similar to our Saturday breakfast, except ours was better! Why? Because our waffles were whole grain. Yuck you say, bad attitude I say. I made a straight substitution, whole spelt flour for the all purpose flour the recipe called for. Being I had little time (until my child's next feeding) and Daniel and I were hungry I kept it simple. I used a recipe out of The Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book. I must say I have better waffle recipes, but they require an overnight rise. Here is a pancake recipe I love, Sourdough silver dollar pancakes. These can't be beat, but require some prep the night before.

At any rate the quick fix waffles were very good this morning. Spelt flour is lighter in color than whole wheat and has a milder flavor. It is perfect for quick breads, muffins, cookies, and pancakes or waffles. Try it yourself, be sure to get whole spelt flour and be sure it is fresh. Here's a link to a guide to whole grain storage. Now to clean the mess up...

Mommy Meal Tips

None of these are earth shattering and most people reading this will probably have some better tips of their own. Feel free to share!

-Cook early in the day when the baby is happy, rather than waiting till "the witching hour", 4-6 is not a happy time around here. This is so obvious, but I guess it has taken this stubborn housewife a while to have her little routine shaken up. Gosh I wonder where Simeon gets his determination?

-We eat more processed food, now I just don't have time to cut up sweet potato fries so I bought a big bag of already prepared ones. But I'm not giving up my quest to eat healthy, we'll just have to look for some healthy and cheap quick fix items.

-After talking to a friend, I prepared a "staple meal list". This is a list of meal I typed, printed out, and posted to our refrigerator. They are not dependent on fresh items, they consist of staples we have on hand all the time and they are quick to cook. This is working out pretty well. I'm not entirely giving up spontaneous and exotic meals but I just don't have the time to cook them or ability to acquire the ingredients every night. But I try to have variety, for example yesterday I cooked Mock Manti from my Greek cookbook and frozen spinach with toasted pine nuts and feta. This was quick and got the husband stamp of approval. I want to add more to our list, feel free to share yours.

What's Important

I guess I could have called this priorities 2 because it is a continuation of my previous post about my life after baby. Well much has changed for me since August 4th 2009. I am so very blessed to be a momma, what a joy that big grin is to me. I spend most of my days feeding and diapering my sweet Simeon. And when I'm not doing one of those things I am running about trying to clean our house, cook something to eat, and possibly groom my very neglected dog.

I felt bad for letting my blog posts drop to nothing, I even considered shutting it down. But my dear husband told me it was ok to let it sit for a bit. That made me feel better, that even though I don't have time or more importantly the mental energy to work on this blog I don't have to quit it forever! The picture by the way is not new, I'll try to get a newer one up soon. And I feel that way about many things I used to love to do. I knew that babies were lots of work, but I guess deep down I was hoping for an easy baby that slept a lot so I could still accomplish everything I wanted to for our house. Well there are many days my boy doesn't nap much and after taking care of him I have little time or energy to cook us a healthy meal. Not that I don't still try. I had an idea I could feed Simeon strap him in the baby carrier and go. Well I'm glad it works for some but errands are hit and miss for us. Some days like today grocery shopping is great, he just chills in the carrier and is fine. But last week we went to return a few items and I had about 15 minutes before he had a crank out. Every baby is different and I'm learning to take a day at a time and to enjoy my blessed time with him.

But I have come to the realization that my ideas of running a frugal healthy household might have to have some tweaking at least for the present. Now I'm not giving up but I'm done with browbeating myself for not fixing a fresh salad for every supper, hanging out the clothes on the line, and waking up before Daniel to cook his breakfast. I love doing these things, but my job now is to take care of my dear boy. One day he will sleep more, I hope anyway, and I can start doing more and he can help me.

Casserole Queen

Ever since Simeon was born I have become the casserole queen. Not quite as much in the last few weeks, but without casseroles we may have starved. Now I'm sure we all know newborns are demanding, but I didn't have any idea of how demanding until I got my very own! For the first few months Simeon wanted to eat pretty much all day and usually in the time I used to prepare Daniel and me supper. Suppers prepared well ahead of time was a must. I'm very very fortunate to have a wonderful husband to help me out. I would have eaten mac and cheese for 2 and a half months if it wasn't for him (and everyone that brought us food of course).

The beauty of casseroles is they are great for preparing ahead and having meals for several nights. This is why my family ate so many of them growing up and why I have avoided them until now. If you have time to fix steamed veggies or a salad and an entree of some type every night you don't need the convenience of casseroles. And one day maybe I will prepare more fresh meals but I see far more casseroles in my future. I will try to post more ideas for healthier casseroles as I run across them.

Here are a few little tips for making casseroles "healthier" and tastier:

1. Use whole grain noodles, bread or cracker crumbs, or brown rice depending on the recipe
2. Use cage free eggs and high quality cheese (you are going to be stretching them out with whatever starches or veggies are in the casserole)
3. Don't be afraid to improvise and add some color (veggies): sun-dried tomatoes, spinach, zucchini, etc.

Hippie Momma

Baby carrying is something I really wanted to do so I bought several different carriers, 2 slings, 1 Maya Wrap, and was given another wrap style front carrier.

I even passed up the infant car seat with the removable carrier in favor of a convertible rear/front facing car seat. I had a feeling I would have a big baby and he might not be in that seat for long. So I spent more on a nicer convertible seat. And I thought, no biggie I'll pop the baby in the sling and head on to the doctor, grocery, etc.

I'm so busy around the house: going to the garden, hanging out clothes, baking bread, etc. So I was depending on being able to pop my baby in the sling and go. Well guess what, babies have their own personalities and mine doesn't like having his head crammed into a sling. The videos make the babies look so comfortable, but mine never seemed too cozy. Plus he was mad everytime I put him in, screamed. The best luck I had was with the wrap style front carrier, but it is a little difficult to put on and he slides down in it. I feel like I need to support him with one hand still.

The more bad baby wearing experiences I had the more depressed I became. I started thinking maybe I should have gotten the infant carrier car seat. And I resigned myself to not being as mobile with my newborn as I wanted to be. Then while looking on a diapering website I ran into this wonderful invention: the Beco Butterfly 2 baby carrier. It seemed comfortable, easy to adjust, very supportive, and cute! So I researched it as well as I could on the net and asked my wonderful husband for one for my birthday (last week). Unfortunately it is expensive. But I'm hoping to sell some of my other carriers and recoup some money. We only used them once, anyone interested?

Well it came today and Simeon and I both love it. Why?
- comfort- he has room to move while being supported and it doesn't kill my back
- ease of use- the easiest to figure out of all my baby carriers
- most of all I wore it for an hour and he didn't scream once! Success!

I'm sure there's plenty of people out there that have had great experiences with other carriers, but every mom and every child is different and has their own needs. Clothesline here I come again!

Priorities

So I have been absent for awhile due to the birth of this little guy, Simeon Paul Root born August 4, 2009 at 1:32 AM. His stats: 8 lb 1oz, 20.5 in. Having a child was an experience like no other. If I was a great blogger I would have had pictures up already and blogged sooner. But as I'm not great at updating this blog on a good day, the business of the last month got the better of me.

I titled this blog priorities because I definitely have had a shift in mine. Having a child foremost has made me appreciate my own parents more, how I have taken them for granted. And I am quickly learning how to do things very quickly: shower, throw together a breakfast casserole, groom the dog... My free time is much more rare so I have to make the best of it.

The last month has been busy, tiring, emotionally overwhelming, but so wonderful! Some of my pet projects have taken the back burner: knitting, our garden, hanging out our clothes, and even baking. I'm really hoping to pick some of those activities on a more limited basis soon. So maybe on this blog I will be featuring more quick tips than I have before!

Garden Lessons

So I haven't posted much in the last month about my garden or anything else. I feel like me and my garden have fallen victim to heat stroke! Daniel and I worked hard to set up the garden, start our seeds, and transplant them. But after that everything seemed to stall. We had such of a hot June and our yard seemed to suffer in the heat. As did I, just running an errand in 100 degree weather seemed to steal all my pregnant body's energy reserves. And I guess it's no fun to blog about failures anyway.

So the last few weeks have been a blessing, we have gotten rain and a drop in temperatures. Both of which I am so grateful for. Our yard has greened up and I have felt more energetic the past few weeks than I did in June and early July.

As for our garden I will comment on our successes and failures. It has been a hard year for gardeners, even experienced ones. My grandparents garden has not been nearly as successful as it has been in the past. June weather was not good for gardens. My grandparents had a great corn crop, but everything else was either a complete failure or the yield was far less than it has been in the past. They live out in the country and have too big of a garden to water in times of drought. My Granny and PopPop were disappointed, but told me to not give up because this year was bad. They're already getting their fall tomatoes going.

As for our garden I will list some lessons learned:
1. Get started early or on time, but not late. This was a big mistake for us this year because it got so hot so early.
2. Pick out appropriate plants for your area. The cool weather tomatoes and onion seeds I bought were not such of a bright choice.
3. Plant carefully for your space, the melons (that have produced one melon) are overrunning our side yard, as you see from the pictures.

I planted some garlic last fall and I was really excited when I dug it up a few weeks ago and it had plentifully multiplied. I'm planning on planting some more this fall. It was super easy and successful. I got our seeds from our health food coop because I am interested in growing heirloom variety plants. The seed company the coop carries is Seeds of Change. And I will say I have already ordered a catalog and plan on spending far more time selecting the varieties I plant next year. I don't consider our garden a total failure, as you can see from the pictures our garden is really very pretty, beautiful plants (even without much fruit). Daniel told me to do the research and I'd figure it out like I did with my whole grain bread, I had to bake a lot of bricks before I could bake a good loaf!

Dog Days of Summer

I am so very hot, of course it's no wonder I am 33 weeks pregnant! It's not even officially summer here, but it sure feels like it.

My pampered puppy is not enjoying the heat either. I walked him this morning without my dear husband, who is feeling a bit under the weather. And we had a late start, because I wanted to do a few little projects in the yard while it was cool (like a humid 78 is cool!). And shortly after we started he kept pulling and wanting to go back home. If I didn't know how much we both need exercise I would have given in. Don't worry about my furry friend, he has all day long to recover from our walk while everyone else is working:)

So Daniel says I have been nesting and it is true. I only have a little time left before Simeon is here! Yesterday my parents were so kind to give me a very nice chest of drawers to go in his room. The nursery is a little room so a big dresser was out. I have white furniture in there, which was also given to us. God has really blessed us with good friends and family! So today I changed out hardware, trickier than I thought it would be, cleaned the chest, and now I'm taking inventory of the clothes we have and washing.

As far as new food things, my garden is so slow and I'm so impatient. We have one green tomato, but lots of blooms. Our melon plants are thriving and have lots of blooms also. When they start producing I think we'll have many melons. Speaking of melons I may have to go to the farmers market and buy a watermelon. That sounds very cool.

A Gracious Plenty

A Gracious Plenty indeed. I have done a few cookbook reviews on my blog and I'm adding one more to my list.

The link above will take you to Amazon's website where the books is tragically no longer in print, but you can get it used. I would highly recommend buying this book, you need it.

It is a little ironic that I'm blogging about this cookbook now. It is a great resource for many different recipes, but especially great southern vegetable dishes. I have really enjoyed using it to cook simple and delicious okra, tomato, or almost any other southern vegetable. The irony is this year has been so tough for farmers, and my grandparents, the great source of our summer vegetables have had a horrible garden year. I always really appreciate what they send us, as a child I didn't know how blessed we were to receive "groceries" from Granny and PopPop. Now I absolutely cherish them and have tried to carry on the tradition by growing our own. And to think last year I canned tomatoes because we had such of a surplus!

This cookbook is great even if you must go to the farmers market to buy your own vegetables to cook. I cooked a great and super simple okra and sausage recipe that Daniel really liked. That is always the marker for whether a dish is successful or not. I will really eat almost anything, unfortunately I think most of my taste buds are dead. I can taste things, but I don't pick up on subtle notes of bitterness or the like. Plus texture weirdness doesn't bother me. Thankfully Daniel is not picky, but if he doesn't like something I probably won't fix it again. Most everything I have prepared from this cookbook has been a hit. The techniques are fairly simple, the ingredient lists short, and the recipes are fairly healthy. Yes sausage and bacon are used, but I'm not going to get in that debate now. I have several past posts on that subject.

I love that many of the recipes are probably similar to what my great grandparents cooked. One of my favorite PopPop lines is "if you'd come to Hebron 70 years ago talking about a canola (oil) people wouldn't know what you were talking about", this was during one of his favorite stories, rendering a pig. My grandparents grew up doing things very differently than we do now. And I'm certainly not saying all progress is bad, but these recipes are definitely worth preserving. If you can get your hands on one of these cookbooks please do and cherish it like I do!

Getting ready for Simeon

So another non-food blog post here. I finally finished my sweater I have been working on for about 3 weeks. And I also finished my first wrap style diaper cover. I've got to sew the buttons on the diaper cover, after I decide where they should be placed. The sweater seems big and the diaper cover small. I'll have to try the diaper cover with the newborn prefolds I ordered on a tiny baby before I make more. I'm 30 weeks now and I'm feeling more pressure to get things done. I have a feeling the next few months are going to fly.

Laundry updates

I know three posts in one day, so I should be good for a month right? I attempted to take a picture of our newly extended clothesline and my soap making supplies.

Truth be known I am not a cheap person. I never have racked up massive debt, but let's put it this way. I have a taste for quality. But since going more natural I wanted a simplified laundry detergent without all the chemical additives. This recipe is 3 ingredients: a bar of laundry soap (zote is my personal choice), borax, and washing soda (not baking). The Zote I buy at Brookshires, and the borax and washing soda come from Kroger. If you are interested in making your own laundry soap here's a great resource: http://www.soapsgonebuy.com/category_s/24.htm.

I do have people ask me about this since most people don't make their own cleaning supplies. I make the powdered version because of my tendency to make messes in general. The worst part is grating the soap. Thankfully the weather is nice here this week so I sat outside on the porch grated away while watching a really corny 80's movie on my laptop. Now I know that there are many busy people out there who don't have time for this. Please don't feel guilty for buying laundry detergent. This is just a way that I can save my family money and since I contribute no actual income to the family it is important that I find these money saving opportunities.

I absolutely love my clothesline, it makes me feel like I'm harnessing some of our natural resources (lots of heat in Mississippi) and saving $ at the same time. But the line was too short so after consulting with my handy husband he instructed me on how to double it's length. A drill and a screw in hook later we have enough clothesline to dry an entire load at once.

I'm a grandma

No I'm really not. But sometimes my love of vintage and retro makes me feel like one. Take my new hobby, knitting. I love it but I do feel kinda old lady surrounded by all my gear at times. I was showing Daniel's parents my cute diaper cover and partially completed sweater and his mom remarked, "that looks like something Richard's mom would have had made for Daniel." I really did think it was funny and I don't mind having old fashioned tastes.

This pic is of my mostly completed sweater, my goal is to have it done by Friday. Daniel and I are going to be driving a lot on Saturday and I want to start on my new diaper covers. I'm using thinner yarn and hopefully will get a less bulky diaper cover. I have enjoyed my bulky yarn, it knits up quick and hides my many boo boos.

Bean of the week club

So for those of you who have been around my husband for more than 5 minutes lately you can tell we are really into Dave Ramsey right now. We have always had a budget and tracked it, but we haven't always tried super hard to stay within it's confines. Well little baby on the way has changed that.

Thankfully we agree on most areas of the budget, but our grocery budget has been a point of contention. Before we got married Daniel spent far less on groceries, but he also ate lots of frozen cardboard pizzas. Blah! SO in comes Elizabeth with her exotic tastes and love of heirloom and organic foods. Yeah real budget blower. This year I've been trying really hard to still buy healthy but still stay in the budget. We've been eating lots of potatoes, carrots, celery, onions, and lettuce (most of the time organic). I will occasionally throw in the more expensive veggies. I recently discovered the secret to cooking great cabbage, like my granny can. It's generous amounts of butter and not overcooking. I shop the organic meat and dairy case for clearance items. I get wonderful fresh eggs locally for a great price. I bake our own bread, can jam when we have free fruit. And my dear husband still thinks we spend to much. So I asked him what he would like to change about our diet to bring the money spent down.

So Daniel told me about this article he read about some guy that ate healthy on a low budget. His secret- stretching the meat out with grains and legumes. I'm not sure how much dairy he ate, but I'm not giving up my organic dairy yet. So I told him I'd try to start cooking more beans if he'd eat them. And Daniel has been very good natured about it all, as he usually is. Last week I made pork & bean stew, with green bell peppers, sweet potatoes, onions, christmas lima & pinto beans, nice hunks of pork, and a little yummy organic pepperoni to spice it up. The recipe came from the Joy of Cooking. We have one more serving, but I did put a bunch up in the freezer. Now that my freezer is back to normal function I can start stockpiling meals. It is so nice when I don't feel like cooking.

I'm really glad that Daniel has pushed me to cook more legumes, I really like them. I guess I haven't been cooking them out of laziness. I'll get Daniel to take a pic of our bean of the week today, a favorite Caribbean black bean stew and brown rice.

Local Fresh Eggs

Yummy pictures courtesy of Daniel. Like the title implies all these dishes have eggs as an essential ingredient. Not just any eggs mind you, free range organic from my farmer friend Hal of Abby Farms. This first picture is a Monte Cristo sandwich. Daniel made this delicious breakfast on Saturday. There are many variations, ours had: bacon, strawberry jam, farmers cheese, mustard. Then Daniel dipped them in egg and cooked them in a cast iron skillet with butter.


These marbled eggs are Daniel's Easter eggs. He hard boiled them, cracked the eggs, and soaked them in soy sauce. They do look pretty cool and they were very tasty.


Finally my contribution to this post, so last night I was tired and had some leftovers I wanted to use up. I had leftover cooked cabbage and chicken, so I searched the wonderful internet and found this wonderful recipe. I will definitely be using it again. It was quick, easy and it made a healthy supper. Here's a link to the recipe Cabbage casserole

My new non-food hobby

Yeah my new hobby isn't photography obviously. But you get the idea right. I have taken up knitting and I'm totally addicted. Just ask my poor husband, he just wants me to put my needles down and really watch a movie with him. But the baby clock is so ticking down. I'm already 28 weeks! This picture is of a pair of wool "soakers" or a diaper cover I made for Simeon. Daniel isn't so sure about the "sweater on his behind" look. But I of course love most anything that looks old timey. This was my third knit project, and my first soaker. Since we're going to be using cloth diapers, I need to make more soakers. But the next few will be knit with a thinner yarn producing a trimmer soaker.

Back to Reality

So Daniel and I were gone last week on a wonderful trip to the beach. We were in St. Augustine, Florida for a friend's wedding. We decided to make a week out of it and shared the beach house with some good friends. It was a good time for our spoiled dog to get used to being abused by children. He passed most tests with flying colors. I thought this picture was ridiculous and I couldn't help myself from posting it.

We had a good trip and I feel refreshed and ready to get back on the frugal wagon. Spending time with Holly was fun, she's really into couponing and has inspired me to search for coupons for products we regularly buy. As much as I'd love to be entirely self sufficient, we aren't nearly there and saving money on my favorite organic brands is a big help.

Our friend's little girl wore a beautiful silk dress to the wedding, and her mother was lamenting the horrible dry cleaning fees. I shared this page with her. I have used these techniques to clean wool, silk, and rayon with no casualties yet. I thought the article did a good job of explaining why you can't throw these items through a regular wash cycle without damage. This is the product I use. Even though I used my homemade laundry detergent for most items it is still cheaper to use a cap of this than to pay outrageous dry cleaning fees. I try not to lament all the money I wasted dry cleaning before stumbling upon these tips.

I will have some food posts soon I promise, as soon as the sun comes back out I'll take a pic and do a little garden update.

Local Businesses are best

So I don't know if I have discussed my kitchen repair projects before. No nothing as fun as beautifying my totally groovy 1970's kitchen style. I have some appliance issues. My mixer runs like a loud train, I need to take it to be serviced. And up until a few days ago my beloved deep freezer chirped like a bird. Unfortunately the chirping meant the fan motor (on the inside of the unit) was going off. And I put off repairing it, I was too busy, there was too much food in there, I didn't have the money...

Two weeks ago I had a national appliance company come out and look at it. It wouldn't make the noise, so the repairman wanted to wait and come back when it would. Now he was a very competent man, but his company is super busy. So the inevitable happened probably a few days ago it died. I called this national company two days ago and tomorrow was the quickest they could be here. Not quick enough for all my expensive organic meat!

Daniel urged me to call around this morning and I called all the companies in our area in the yellow pages. And I prayed a lot. We are going out of town next week and what would I do with my food? I guess to some people this wouldn't be a big deal. But part of my "job" as a housewife is finding food to store away, putting up strawberries, finding great deal on meats, cooking big meals and freezing some for later. Losing all my food was losing all my hard work.

So one of the companies called back, JW with Appliance Specialist. Look him up in the yellow pages. He came out, took the freezer apart immediately. He had to go get a part from the appliance repair store, but he still did this within hours of my call. I love small business owners, they care about their business so they care about pleasing the customer. Now hopefully my freezer is going to cool off quickly and I can put my meat back in there. Oh the dry ice, I had to run out and buy some to try to keep things cool. What a day. I still have to bake.

Strawberry Pineapple Marmalade

So Daniel had a post about LA strawberries being in season now. And we have been enjoying them. I decided I wanted to make some jam and process it. There was a post last summer about us making salsa, and it was really a learning experience. We didn't have all the equipment we needed and we didn't know what we were doing. After a few mistakes, and after talking to some people with experience I feel like I might actually be able to preserve some things I could give to people. Daniel and I ate what I canned last year, but I didn't feel quite confident giving any salsa or jam away.


So I got this cookbook last summer, Putting It Up With Honey: A Natural Foods Canning and Preserving Cookbook by Susan Geiskopf. I used it to make some fig honey jam that we have enjoyed all winter. That was a money saving endeavor, because some friends gave us huge bags of figs (free food!) But I will say the strawberry marmalade did cost me. The recipe called for one pineapple, 4 oranges, and 6 cups (sliced) strawberries. At least I had enough jars and lids I didn't have to buy those. Oh yeah the great thing about this book is all the recipes have honey instead of processed sugar, but honey is more expensive. For canning purposes I try to find the cheapest honey I can b/c it is going to be cooked so long whether it is raw or not doesn't matter. I still would like to think that gourmet marmalade would have cost more and not had the unique and healthier qualities of my honey marmalade. It is always amazing to me that you start out with a large amount of fruit and end up with so few jars of jam. You might can tell from the fuzzy picture I ended up with 3.75 jars! I processed the full 3 and the partial Daniel and I are eating on now. I used bigger jars than the recipe called for.

I will say making my own marmalade, jam, etc. is such of a fulfilling activity. I guess similar to making our own bread. Yeah you can find it cheaper in the store, but it won't taste as good or be prepared with as much love.