In past years learning to can pretty much consisted of my Mom doing it for me. I know, I'm the worst daughter ever! This year I've canned beans, salsa and jam and frozen corn and whole tomatoes. I'm so proud of myself. I did have some, ok a lot of help from my Dad. He has the most amazing garden and he shared lots of it with me and he spent all day, I mean ALL DAY doing salsa with me. I don't really like jam and it was all I could do to not eat the entire bowl of raspberries. You see, I have this weird addiction to produce - particularly fruit, and raspberries are among my favorites. When I say addicted to fruit I am not kidding, all summer long I ate an entire watermelon every week. One week I ate an entire watermelon and 6 pounds of cherries plus several other fruits. People ask me all the time if I get sick from eating so much fruit and the answer is no. My body is used to it. I'm trying to eat less fruit now because I'm sure my blood sugar was through the roof. I'm so fascinated by the human body and can I just say, I love food! I want to eat more like my ancestors ate. Not even my ancestors, just my parents and grandparents (with less lard). My Grandpa was a wheat farmer and my Dad has always had a huge garden, raised cows and sometimes chickens and that's what we ate all year. My Mom makes everything from scratch and we sat down as a family to a home cooked meal every night. (Sigh), I dream of raising my family this way. I dream of a bigger garden and feeding my family food that is actually food. As a child watching the butcher shoot our cow and soon after seeing it on the dinner table freaked me out a little, but I have since learned a thing or two about food and I actually really love this way of life. Now I mentioned that I don't really like jam, but my family does. Dustin eats raspberry jam on mashed potatoes (so weird) so, I resisted the raspberries and turned them into this freezer jam. Isn't it cute? So proud of myself!
