Preserving Food without Freezing or Canning: Traditional Techniques Using Salt, Oil, Sugar, Alcohol, Vinegar, Drying, Cold Storage, and Lactic Fermentation

Product Features

• ISBN13: 9781933392592
• Condition: New
• Notes: BUY WITH CONFIDENCE, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and service to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed

From the Editors

Typical books about preserving garden produce nearly always assume that modern "kitchen gardeners" will boil or freeze their vegetables and fruits. Yet here is a book that goes back to the future—celebrating traditional but little-known French techniques for storing and preserving edibles in ways that maximize flavor and nutrition.<br /><br />Translated into English, and with a new foreword by Deborah Madison, this book deliberately ignores freezing and high-temperature canning in favor of methods that are superior because they are less costly and more energy-efficient.<br /><br />As Eliot Coleman says in his foreword to the first edition, "Food preservation techniques can be divided into two categories: the modern scientific methods that remove the life from food, and the natural 'poetic' methods that maintain or enhance the life in food. The poetic techniques produce... foods that have been celebrated for centuries and are considered gourmet delights today."<br /><br /><i>Preserving Food Without Freezing or Canning</i> offers more than 250 easy and enjoyable recipes featuring locally grown and minimally refined ingredients. It is an essential guide for those who seek healthy food for a healthy world.
Product Description

Customer Response

Preserving Food
Book contains good information on historical ways to preserve food but canning and freezing would seem to trump these methods. For those interested in the alternatives book provides ideas and recipes.

not really traditional
There are interesting recipes in this book. But if you search something which disappointed. First of all I am missing some non European recipes like kimche. On the other hand there are lots of similar recipes of the same thing like different varieties of sauerkraut. And there is at least one translation error: sauerkraut is certainly not made with cumin, the spice is called tarragon or caraway and very different.
There are too many different varieties of root cellaring or storing vegetables in sand, once you've got the principle you can figure out your own way of storing.

But still, there are some interesting recipes and the I don't regret having bought this book.

An excellent book on food preservation
Basically this covers all of the non-freezing and non-canning food preservation techniques. Root cellaring (cold storage), lactic fermentation (pickles, sauerkraut), salt, oil, sugar, alcohol, and vinegar presevations, and drying are all discussed along with recipes taking advantage of each technique. I found the methods to be more useful than the recipes, which are quite simple and really are templates more than precise recipes. For just fermentation, the book Wild Fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods is I think more informative, and root cellaring gets more coverage in Root Cellaring: Natural Cold Storage of Fruits & Vegetables. But for the other techniques, this is a good book.

Loved this book because of the historical and practical info.
Each of the recipes is provided by, and credited to a specific person who has actually used the technique. The book was created by the Gardeners and Farmers of Terre Vivante in France and translated into English. Occasionally there will be a food or technique that is specific to France and doesn't translate well to the U. S., but, even then, it's interesting. The techniques covered include: Root cellering, drying ,lactic fermentation, preserving in oil, preserving in vinegar, preserving with salt, preserving with sugar, sweet-and-sour preserves, & preserving in alcohol. There are not many illustrations, but, the directions are so complete, that I didn't feel a need for them. I also, am an experienced cook. This might not be the book for the beginner.
I found this book as I was exploring information about fermentation in preparation for a class. My favorite fermentation book is WILD FERMENTATION by Sandor Ellix Katz. Both of these books are published by a wonderful small press, Chelsea Green, found at: [...]
Charli Vogt, RN, MN, MPH
[...]

Love it!
My wife and I are going through the book now. My grandmother was French/German and I remember seeing a lot of the methods described in the book used by her.

I'd highly recommend the book. I do, however, have a question and it concerns preserving corn with slaked lime. Though not stated the method implies the preservation of sweet corn. How would slaking be done with sweet corn? I've found plenty of information on using the method for field corn but nothing about sweet corn.

Other than that dangler the book is an excellent resource.

Others also Liked

Root Cellaring: Natural Cold Storage of Fruits & Vegetables
Seed to Seed: Seed Saving and Growing Techniques for Vegetable Gardeners
Handy Farm Devices, 2nd: And How to Make Them
Build Your Own underground Root Cellar
Food Drying Techniques: Storey Country Wisdom Bulletin A-197