Please join us in picking strawberries to welcome the beginning of Summer! Unfortunately the timing depends on the changes in weather and when the strawberries decide to ripen but this should occur late May through June. If interested please contact (XXX) XXX-XXXX or xxxx@gmail.com if you would like to be notified when the strawberry season is beginning. The Hines Family would love to welcome more help in picking strawberries and then enjoying the fruits of labor in the form of strawberry jam and strawberry pie!
Strawberries are a very important item of food within my family. The strawberries give my family a chance to work together and talk while we work as mentioned by Atkins-Sayre, “Food provides more than just the start of a conversation; we argue that food is also a part of the conversation.” (Atkins-Sayre, 2014:90).
When my family starts the cleaning and canning after picking the strawberries we talk about anything and everything. Anything from school to the strawberries themselves and what type of harvest was had is discussed. Strawberries also help us mark the spring transition into summer and give us jam that we enjoy all year long and pie, which we enjoy for a few days before the pie disappears. We would be happy to invite you into the conversation during the waiting process for the jam to cool!
Canning
Cans are vital in the canning process. They need to be sanitized before use so that nothing untoward grows in your jam and makes everything inedible. Shown above is the typical can used within my family for everything from pickling items to strawberry jam.
- How to Sanitize
- Two options:
- 1. If your dishwasher has a sanitizing setting that can be used
- 2. You can boil water and then put the cans in the boiling water for about 10 minutes to sanitize them
- Two options:
Strawberry jam is a staple food item that exists in my household and within my family’s traditions. The strawberry jam process has a secret ingredient that I can’t divulge, but you are welcome to come help with the strawberry-picking and the tasting of the jam after it is complete. The pie-making process is also a family-guarded secret, but I will talk about the history below.
Family & Pie
My grandmother (pictured above) passed down the tradition of the whole strawberry canning and pie-making process. Though the specific pie process is a secret (the hard work and love of family members : ) ), I can divulge how the traditions around it have changed.
When it was my grandmother, mom, and uncle, the strawberry picking process could take a little while, but the fruits of labor were always worth it. My grandmother would take the strawberries and magically transform them from simple, but delicious fruits into a staple pantry item that was enjoyed by the entire family and such a delicious pie that it can disappear within an afternoon.
My mother has now come to enjoy the canning process as it brings us together as a family now that we (my brother and I ) are growing up and starting to head to college, which means that we are away from home more often. My mother enjoys the fact that we all come together to do an activity as a family and actually enjoy the process as a family. What started out as a chore for her as a child has turned into a way for us all to get together as a family and make items (strawberry jam and pie) that we can enjoy as a family.
…contemporary understandings of food traditions as dynamic and fluid, and understanding of identity as performed according to specific contexts, audiences, and purposes.” (Long, 2021:48)
This quote exemplifies how the strawberry jam and pie-making process have changed within my family. At first it was my grandmother, mother, and uncle, in the past few years it has been my own family (mom, dad, brother, and me), and now that we are inviting you, you can be added to the fluidity of our tradition!
My family has always considered itself Southern and strongly Kentuckian as the families emerged from the hollers of Eastern Kentucky from Greenup to Letcher county, so the quote…
““The way [Southerners] cultivate, prepare, and consume food reflects the social, economic, and political history of the region.”” (Pucciarelli, 2020:157)
fits well with how my family created a tradition around the strawberry jam and pie-making process. The social aspects of making the jam have always been important, but also strawberries were something that was grown on the farm that you didn’t have to buy, so there is also the added aspect of the economic advantages of making the strawberries last as long as possible. The jam that we will make, if you will join us, will last for up to a year (unless you eat it too fast, which has been known to happen).
I hope I have convinced you to join me and my family in our strawberry-picking and food-making adventures!!
Sources
Atkins-Sayre, W., & Stokes, A. (2014). Crafting the Cornbread Nation: The Southern Foodways Alliance and Southern Identity. Southern Communication Journal, 79(2), 77–93. https://doi-org.ezproxy.uky.edu/10.1080/1041794X.2013.861010
Long, L. M. (2021). Constructing an Imagined Dinner Table: Culinary Nationalism and the “Ethnic American Cooking” Cookbook. Western Folklore, 80(1), 45-80. http://ezproxy.uky.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy.uky.edu/scholarly-journals/constructing-imagined-dinner-table-culinary/docview/2465479191/se-2?accountid=11836
Pucciarelli, D. (2020). The Southern Diet. Nutrition Today, 55(4), 157–162. DOI: 10.1097/NT.0000000000000425.
Permalink: http://jrouhier.createuky.net/?p=333
