The newest and most energy-hungry methods of food preservation are well known to all: refrigeration and freezing – and of course, canning. Your grandmother (and if you’re very lucky, your mother) may also have made regular use of pickling and potting and making preserves.
Sadly nowadays time-poor people have little opportunity to cook for their families, let alone make use of harvest time to lay in stores of food for winter. It’s time to regain some control over what we eat, and to re-examine the meaning of Aesop’s fable The Grasshopper and the Ant.
One simple but little-touted food preservation method has been used for centuries in sun-drenched parts of the world: it’s called solar drying, and the results are delicious, with highly concentrated flavours: think of sun-dried tomatoes or apricots. And with the amount of sun we’ve been enjoying over recent weeks here in Leytonstone, it seems a good idea to make constructive use of it.
We’re running a workshop on building your own solar dryer on Saturday August 2nd at Church Lane Community Garden, Harold Road, London E11 4QX, from 12pm to 2pm. Please come along, all welcome.
For further information contact Shannon Thaden on 07450474538 or email scthaden@yahoo.com
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