My memory is not the greatest, many details of my childhood seem to have slid into a slight remembrance of a feeling or mood, whereas, my sister quickly recalls everything.  Somehow my clearest memories are experiences related to food.  Lazy evenings spent on the couch while my mom made dinner listening to NPR; tomato fights in the backyard with the neighborhood kids—I’m sure my mom’s not too fond of that incident; picking raspberries and eating them until I couldn’t eat anymore.

Having evolved into a gardener, my brain touches on these experiences while I’m planting, weeding and harvesting.  Some of my fondest thoughts wander back to visiting my grandparents in British Columbia.  Having moved from a farm in Alberta, the climate in BC was much more tolerable; my grandfather was the gardener in a small town called Naramata in the Okanagon Valley, a haven for fruit growers.  Grandma canned everything from their garden and more, and I used to love to peruse the cold storage room, eyeing the neatly stacked jars of green beans, pickles, peaches, cherries and beets.  It was here that I remember Grandma taking us up the hill to hunt for wild asparagus. 

Later, Grandma and Grandpa rented a house on an orchard, and I would run through the cherry trees to the cliff that overlooked the Okanogan Lake.  My visits were in the summer, usually during peach and cherry season.  I would pick the ripe juicy peaches and bite right into them; outside it didn’t matter how messy we got.  That’s also when I got a taste for Bing cherries.  Now store bought cherries and peaches just don’t seem worth my money; they don’t even compare.  Bill June, the orchard owner, would employ my sister and me, paying us 5 cents for every bucket of cherries we picked.  And Grandpa taught us how to shoot the slippery cherry pits out from between thumb and forefinger.

G & G always had a wonderful vegetable garden.  Being the grazer then that I still am, I would rummage through their garden, munching whatever I could find, and that is when Grandma warned me not to eat the rhubarb.  I did try a bite, which fortunately was not very appetizing; and, believe it or not, I still love rhubarb!

My grandparents are no longer around, but they are with me all the time; when I put up my pea supports, or dig compost into the garden.  I also think about the lessons they taught me about frugality; lessons they learned and lived during the Depression.  And I’m not entirely sure why these memories are so sharp; I know smell is a memory trigger, and it could be related to that.  Or is it that food is a basic need, and being able to learn and remember plants is essential for survival.  Either way, I love fresh food; gardening is my therapy, and working as the market manager for the Tremont Farmers’ Market is one of the most gratifying jobs I’ve ever had.  Farmers are the salt of the earth, and I am proud to support them in any way I can.

Peace,

Jody Lathwell

Tremont Farmers’ Market Manager

Strawberry jam. It was the beginning. Each lazy summer of my childhood, the litany of preserving the season’s bounty began with strawberry jam. I was reminded by my mother in early June that strawberries would certainly be ripe for my grandfather’s birthday (June 15^th) and that we would be heading out to a nearby farm to pick as soon as they were ready. Strawberries were soon followed by sweet cherries, sour cherries, raspberries, plums, currants, apricots, pears, peaches, and apples. In the middle, of course, came cucumbers for sweet, dill, and bread and butter pickles. And later, canned tomatoes, chutney, corn relish, even sauerkraut. Our basement cellar shelves, filled with empty glass canning jars by spring, soon gleamed again with the reds and yellows and greens of the preserved harvest.

My mother did most of the work, so for me, it was fun picking, pitting, stirring, licking the spoon. For many years after I married and moved away, much of Mother’s summer labor found its way into my pantry. But at some point I realized that I needed to learn how to make the preserves my family had come to love. It began with strawberry jam.

For several years after moving to Cleveland, I would time one of my visits to my mother in Michigan so that I could bring back a lug of ripe strawberries from the farmers’ market to make my jam. It slowly began to dawn on me that driving from Cleveland to Ann Arbor for sweet, ripe strawberries was crazy. And so it was that my involvement in the startup of the North Union Farmers Market began with strawberry jam.

Mother made three completely different kinds of strawberry jam, including one that “baked” in the sun for about a week until the juice was a thick, deep sangria red and the berries were firm and intense with strawberry sweetness. But our favorite, and the easiest to make is the simple cooked jam found inside the box of any commercial pectin. For one batch, here’s what you need:

Start with about 3 quarts of fresh, ripe strawberries (strawberries do not ripen after they have been picked so be sure you get ripe berries to begin with either by picking them yourself or buying them from a farmer.)

7 C of cane sugar (I know it’s a lot, but that’s jam for you)

You will need eight (8) ½ pt jelly jars with lids and screw tops

I put my jelly jars in the dishwasher and wash them when I start the jamming process.

Gather round your helpers to begin hulling the berries. Cut off the green caps (called calyxes) and crush with a knife or potato masher. (I have an ancient aluminum measuring cup that cuts through the berries nicely.)

Measure 5 cups of crushed berries into an 8 qt heavy enamel cookpot and begin to heat to a boil. You may add ¼ C of lemon juice, if you like the flavor. I do not add lemon juice.

Gradually stir in the pectin and continue cooking to bring the mixture to a full rolling boil. You can add a bit of butter to reduce the foam.

At this point, you should have a shallow saucepan slowing boiling in which to sterilize the lids and soften the rubber on the seal. Put the lids into the boiling water.

After the berries and pectin have come to a full boil, add the sugar and stir constantly until the mixture returns to a full rolling boil again and boil for 1 minute.

Remove the jam from the heat and retrieve the hot jars from the dishwasher. Spoon the hot jam into the jars, leaving about ¼ inch of space at the top. Wipe the top of the jar clean and dry of any slopped jam. Use a tongs to take the hot lid out of the boiling water to set it onto the jar of jam and screw down the lid. Repeat the process until you have filled the jam jars. Any left over jam can be eaten immediately or saved for toast in the morning. When your jars are filled and cooling on the counter, listen for the gentle “pop” as the cooling jam creates a vacuum in the top of the jar. Jam can be stored in the pantry until next strawberry season, if it lasts that long.

It has been said that if we could only remember an experience with eating that gave us an orgasmic reaction to flavors, we and find our way back to truly good food.  Anyone born after 1980, of course, has a much more difficult time conjuring up such a memory because the industrial food revolution was pretty much complete by then making it nearly impossible to buy truly delicious, fresh foods.  Nevertheless, a resurgence of interest in food, farmers markets, artisan products, and imported specialty foods may offer hope for new generations to experience memorable flavors.  As an experiment, we invite you to send your memories or reflections on a great food moment.  Be our guide to forgotten flavors and the joys of eating.

Send us your food memory here…