Can we embrace the best of the old and new technology at the same time, does the use of one necessarily mean the abandonment of the other? These thoughts passed through my mind as I lamented my difficulty in accessing my tried and true canning recipes due to a computer crash whilst spending some quality family time with my daughter and family canning some of the glut of pears from one of our trees.
My frustrations with the computer over the last few weeks highlighted just how much I rely upon it for quick and easy access to information, both my own saved recipes, rants and ramblings and for daily updates of news and opinion from the internet. Meanwhile here I was using pioneer methods to preserve current crops for future use, not only that but we were not using “modern” methods of heating but everything was done outside on our wood fired BBQ.
Many folks do much of their cooking on the BBQ during the summer but usually upon a propane fired unit (yes we do use propane a stove in the winter months) and to try and handle the volume we were doing on either such unit would be a real difficulty. I begin to see the value of those big old pioneer cook stoves, although I don’t think I would really want to be in the kitchen in late August after preparing preserves for 5 or 6 hours! Our 15sq ft grill was jammed at times with various pots of fruit, jars being sterilized, water bathed product, canning syrup etc etc. The Kamp Kitchen was a hive of industry of washing, cutting and peeling, the table covered with bags of sugar, jars, lids and ladles, and yes, the odd empty beer bottle!
Our daughter has grown up seeing us do a little canning each year but to her husband it was a totally new experience, one which I think made quite an impression. Perhaps the final product, brandied peaches, was the turning point! Meanwhile they went home with jars of pears, mixed fruit, pear mincemeat, pickled beets, dill pickles and several more “exotic” canning experiments of their choice. It’s a good job Keady market is only open the one day or I would still be stoking the fire, as it was we used half a cord of wood. But just think about the hydro one would have used to do it on an electric stove, no wonder this tradition is limited to a few country kitchens. I fact when asked by her young colleagues what she was going to do for her holidays and my daughter replied “I am going to my Mom & Dads to do some canning” she got some rather strange looks!
All this is my way of saying whilst I rely upon modern technology heavily in some areas I do not let it dictate my choice of using less modern methods where it seems a better for one reason or another. I do have those recipes written down or in a book somewhere but finding them is not always easy, I think after all these years my personal hard disk (the one on my shoulders) need defragging because the retrieval process is getting slow at times!
Perhaps it is a mindset of those my age, but as one who has worked in the service and repair industry all my life, I daily see equipment where I say to my son “on the older models you could adjust this” or “this is made even cheaper (read less reliable) than last years”. Older is not necessarily better but in many cases can be a better choice, we must carefully pick which products and methods are a good choice for us and not a total waste of time, money and resources.
Now back to rescuing my files and canning tomatoes, hope I don’t get the two mixed up!
