I’ve always liked to cook and bake, but one thing I’ve never done until the last couple of weeks is canning, the practice of preserving foods like jams or pickles in heat-treated airtight cans or jars. Confession #1 is that I’ve always found the idea a bit intimidating! Despite many years working in biology labs and confidently maintaining sterile solutions to prevent contamination of cultured cells, I think there was still part of me that worried about getting the food safety aspect of canning right. But I’ve finally taken my first baby steps into the world of canning and it really wasn’t as complicated as I thought it might be! While there are certainly some key steps to doing it safely, it isn’t difficult, at least for simple things like jam. So today I’d like to share a few things I’ve learned about jam-making and canning from books we have in our collection and some reading online.

Last summer, I came across sour cherries at one of the small, fancier grocery stores in the area. Whenever I see fruits I haven’t had before — plumcots! sugar-apples! Manzano bananas! — I’m always curious to give them a try and that was the first time I’d seen sour cherries for sale. Sour cherries, also known as tart cherries, are a bit too sour for most people to want to eat raw, but they are great for making jams and baked goods. They also tend to have a very short season, typically only a few weeks in July here in Ontario, so if you see them, act fast!