Preserving Food Without Freezing or Canning by The Gardeners & Farmers of Terre Vivante

I give this book 10 out of 10 acorns.

I don't recall how or where I first saw it, but the "traditional techniques" in the title was immediately appealing to me. So I bought the book and haven't been disappointed. It's a complied work by the gardeners and farmers of Terre Vivante in Isere, France. The original idea of publishing the book was to preserve the preservation techniques, themselves, but I have found it to be a fantastic resource for my permaculture lifestyle.

The book sports two forwards, one by Eliot Coleman for the first edition, and one by Deborah Madison, which was added to the second edition. The Preface explains "How This Book Came to Be." The introduction explains the benefit of these methods—preservation that preserves nutrient value. It also touches on safety issues. Each chapter discusses a different preservation technique and includes instructions and recipes.

Chapter 1, "Preserving in the ground or in a cold cellar." Contains a chart of vegetables that can be left in the ground all winter, and discusses various methods of underground storage including trenching, a choice of underground containers to make, and root cellaring. The last section of this chapter discusses increasing shelf life at room temperature. For example, squashes keep longer if oiled (includes a chart of how long various squashes keep), gruyere cheese can be stored in ash, and both squash and tomatoes keep longer if wrapped in newspaper.

Chapter 2 discusses a method many of us are familiar with, preserving by drying. Explains various dehydrating methods: easy-to-make dryer trays, electric dehydrators, oven drying, sun drying, and string drying. Covers a large variety of fruits, vegetables. herbs, flowers and mushrooms. Also some unusual food items, like bread, yeast, and fish.

Chapter 3, "Preserving by Lactic Fermentation." Lots of recipes in this chapter, starting with several for the all-familiar sauerkraut. More unusual foods to ferment include green beans, radishes, Swiss chard ribs, tomatoes, zucchini, and plums. Recipes include various vegetable medleys, tomato balls, tomato sauce, and many more.

Chapter 4, "Preserving in Oil." This is where I got the idea to store my feta cheese in herbed olive oil! In addition to cheeses, recipes are given for eggplant, cherry tomatoes, mushrooms, zucchini, plus a variety of condiments.

Chapter 5 discusses preserving in vinegar. A variety of vegetables, seasonings, and even fruit can be given a longer shelf life in vinegar: beets, Brussels sprouts, cherry tomatoes, green peppers, horseradish, tomatillos, mushrooms, cherries, and grapes.

Chapter 6 is preserving in salt. The modern mindset pretty much considers salt taboo, but it is an ancient preservation method. Includes recipes for grape leaves, green beans, lemons, and rose petals.

Chapter 7 is preserving in sugar as jams and jellies, candied condiments, or in syrups. Lots of recipes here, including a few with no-added sugar: apple-pear molasses, carob honey, apple or pear syrup.

Chapter 8 is entitled, "Sweet-and-Sour Preserves." Lots of condiments in this chapter, including chutneys, relishes, and ketchups. There's also a section of recipes for sweet-and-sour fruits such as cherries, pears, and plums.

The last chapter is "Preserving in Alcohol." There are recipes for various wines and fruits preserved in brandy or wine.

The Appendix contains a handy-dandy chart listing a variety of foods along with the best options for preservation methods.

224 pages, 250 recipes, and filled with lovely hand-drawn illustrations. An excellent book for anyone interested in off grid, low tech, and historical methods of food preservation.

I'm so glad I found this post! I'm going to look for the book. I have been doing a lot of research on the Italian "sott'olio" or confit preservation technique. I want to understand the underlying science so I can do it safely and successfully. I've done some preservation via alcohol and salt, but it's usually small batch condiment-style foods.Eager to dig further into this topic.

Leigh Tate wrote:
Image source: Amazon

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

Has anyone tried the chard stem recipe?

I have used  Traditional Techniques Using Salt, Sugar/honey, Vinegar, Drying, Cold Storage.
I want to use alcohol to store herbs in addition to drying.
The perennial vegetables help a lot in that they are more stable & less work than annuals.  

I just ordered this book from Abe Books -- won't arrive until Nov 30, but $10 cheaper than Amazon.

I find that some of these methods won't work in hot, humid climes. Dehydrating doesn't last because moisture always seems to get in, and of course cold storage is out. Even lacto-fermented veggies have to be refrigerated,
It's tough here, but luckily we can grow all year.

This is just what I've been looking for, and it has the Permies seal of approval.

Cara Campbell wrote:I find that some of these methods won't work in hot, humid climes. Dehydrating doesn't last because moisture always seems to get in, and of course cold storage is out. Even lacto-fermented veggies have to be refrigerated,
It's tough here, but luckily we can grow all year.

Yes, I agree.  One needs to put all sorts of things in the refrigerator, just to keep the mildew/mold/clumping/bugs from ruing them.

Perhaps this is why so many perennial plants are found in the tropics...we can't store the annual stuff, but if we grow a lot of perennials, we're still covered the rest of the year (even if the variety gets reduced.)

Exciting.  I was gonna start canning, but I must say I gave never appreciated  the look of canned food.  It loses its vibrant aliveness.   But I just did my first lacto-fermented salsa and it is wonderful and vibrant!  Just ordered book from Chelsea Green (cheaper than Amazon if you sign up for newsletter...and I like them).Thanks for posting!

If you live in warm humid country then preserving is not as necessary as it is, say, in Minnesota.  Because of the longer growing season the need to preserve is greatly reduced; so, if you live in the deep south maybe this type of food preservation is a moot point anyway.  Warmer longer growing season = less food preservation.

Jane Weeks wrote:I just ordered this book from Abe Books -- won't arrive until Nov 30, but $10 cheaper than Amazon.

I did the same with "Book Depository", $16.71 and free shipping.