Without Screw Top Jars

New Zealand Listener, Volume 4, Issue 89, 7 March 1941, Page 46

Without Screw Top Jars

Dear Aunt Daisy, I have been very interested in your chats on Preserving Fruit without screw top jars. May I give you my experience? During the Great War I was a young mother, with a family of four little ones, learning by experience (and yes, tears as well) to be capable and thrifty, as I had not been domesticated before marriage. Screw top jars were very difficult to obtain, so I decided to try preserving my fruit in jars cut down from bottles. I covered the boiling hot fruit with one inch of unsalted mutton fat and then covered the jar at once with brown paper and flour paste. My first attempt was such a huge success that, except for the fact that I now use modern bottles, I still preserve all my fruit with this method. It eliminates all the worry of

wondering if the jars are air tight, and also saves one’s wrist. I moved from the North Island to the South Island just after a preserving season, ‘and was dubious about bringing my preserves in these makeshift jars, but they all arrived in excellent condition,

I kept 3 jars for 5 years to test for keeping qualities, and they were as good as those used the first year. For many years I made over 300 Ibse of jam each season, and I have never had one jar go mildew. I cover all my jam boiling hot, and with brown paper and flour paste, It is easy, serviceable and economical, Here is a hint for those housewives who find their favourite jam all used first. At the jam-making season I make out a list, putting down, say, the date of each Saturday in the year, I leave 2 or 3 lines between the dates, and on these lines write the number of pots and kinds of jam that can be used for that week. As I take the jam into use it is crossed off the list. If, for instance, I make only 12 pots of a kind then that means one a month, and it is worked on to the list to be used at a week when the everyday kind is being used. See the idea, Aunt Daisy? Lots of my young married friends are now trying out my idea, which has proved most satisfactory over a number of years. I always kept, say half a dozen -_-- --

or more pots of special jams on the reserve list. With best wishes for your continued success in your session. -* Interested" (Papanui). What an interesting letter. It certainly is a sure way of sealing your preserves -and so simple. I like the idea of making out a "budget" of the jams, and it certainly ensures that there is at least some of your favourite jam left for special occasions,