Preserving

In this chapter

• Blanching — A short boil or steam of vegetables, used before freezing to stop enzymes that would otherwise dull flavor, color, and texture in the freezer.
• Brine — Salt dissolved in water — or in the juices a vegetable gives up — used to cover food while it ferments or to hold a pickle in acid liquid.
• Canning — Heat-processing food in sealed jars by a tested method so it can be stored at room temperature; cooking jam alone does not make that claim.
• Canning altitude — Water boils cooler as elevation rises, so tested process times and jelly thermometer cues change — a correction, not a new recipe.
• Chutney — A cooked fruit or vegetable preserve with vinegar, sugar, and spice — cousin to relish, not a pectin jam, and not a ferment.
• Conserve — A thick fruit spread that, in extension language, usually includes mixed fruits and often nuts — a neighbor of jam, not a second pectin science.
• Drying — Preserving food by removing water so it shrinks, lightens, and keeps — complementary to canning and freezing, not a substitute for a tested jar process.
• Fermented hot sauce — Chili mash soured by lactic fermentation, distinct from vinegar-acidified bottled hot sauce, with refrigeration and tested canning processes serving different preservation goals.
• Fermented pickles — Cucumbers or other vegetables soured by lactic fermentation in brine — distinct from fresh-pack pickles, which are acidified with vinegar and are not fermented.
• Freezing — Slowing spoilage by holding food well below refrigerator temperature — a quality method that still starts with clean handling, and for most vegetables, with blanching.
• Fruit butter — Fruit cooked down to a thick, smooth spread — extension lists it with jams and jellies as a sweet fruit product, not as a dairy butter.
• Fruit leather — Fruit puree dried into a flexible sheet — NCHFP treats leather as a drying product, not a canned jam.
• Headspace — The unfilled space left at the top of a canning jar so food can expand and a vacuum can form — a measured gap from a tested process, not a guess.
• Infused vinegar — Vinegar steeped with herbs, fruit, or spice so the acid liquid picks up aroma — still a 5 percent acidity pickle acid, not an oil infusion.
• Jam — Crushed or chopped fruit cooked with sugar until pectin, acid, and concentration set into a spreadable gel — a different claim from a shelf-stable canned jar.
• Jelly — A clear, firm gel made from fruit juice and sugar, not from crushed fruit in the jar.
• Kimchi — Salted napa cabbage and seasonings fermented by lactic acid bacteria — typically with gochugaru — not sauerkraut with chili, and not a canned pickle.
• Koji — Cooked grain or soy grown with Aspergillus oryzae in a solid-state culture so the mold’s enzymes can later saccharify starch and break down protein — an inoculum, not a lacto-ferment and not a home incubation recipe.
• Lacto-fermentation — Preservation and souring by lactic acid bacteria that convert vegetable sugars into lactic acid, as in sauerkraut and fermented pickles — not the same process as a vinegar quick-pickle.
• Marmalade — A soft jelly with pieces of fruit or peel suspended in it, most often made with citrus.
• Miso — Salted soybean paste fermented after a koji stage, aged until enzymes and microbes have broken down protein and starch — not a lacto-pickle and not a pH-4.6 canning process.
• Pickling — Making vegetables or fruit keepable with vinegar, salt, sugar, and spice — either by lactic fermentation or by covering food with a tested acid brine.
• Preserves — Whole fruit or uniform pieces held in a clear, slightly gelled syrup — Ohio State's kitchen definition, and a legal name that U.S. jam identity shares with “jam.”
• Pressure canning — Heat-processing low-acid food in sealed jars under steam pressure so the canner reaches temperatures boiling water cannot — not a pressure cooker and not a substitute for a tested formula.
• Quick pickle — A fresh-pack pickle acidified with vinegar rather than by lactic fermentation — sometimes brined a few hours, then drained and covered with vinegar and seasonings.
• Relish — Chopped fruits or vegetables cooked with vinegar and seasonings into a spoonable pickle — not a fermented crock, and not a pectin gel.
• Sauerkraut — Cabbage fermented in its own salted juice by lactic acid bacteria until it is sour, still crisp, and acid enough to treat as an acid food.
• Sugar pack — Packing fruit with sugar or syrup before freezing to protect flavor, color, and texture — sugar here is not the preservative that heat-canning uses.
• Syrup — Sugar dissolved in water used to pack fruit for canning or freezing — a texture and color tool, not the heat process that makes a jar shelf-stable.
• Tempeh — A compact white cake of dehulled boiled soybeans bound by Rhizopus mycelium — a solid-state mold ferment, not koji, not miso, and not a home incubation recipe.
• Vinegar — An acetic acid solution used as the preserving acid in pickles and as a sour fermented condiment — not the same page as a bottle on the ingredient shelf.