Corn and Strawberries

There are lots of things that remind me of Nana's house, but two at the top of the list are frozen sweet corn and strawberry jam. Today I tackled both. After a call to Nana, of course. I couldn't quite remember the process for freezing corn so I had to call up north and verify the steps. I think she likes it when I do that anyway.

First up: Freezing Sweet Corn

The most important thing about freezing sweet corn is that it must be done the day it is picked. This morning Michael bought 6 dozen ears of corn from our local farmer's market, Tom Leonards. After we cleaned up the kitchen, we started shucking corn...with a little help from Daniel.


Once the corn is shucked, it needs to be boiled for about 2 minutes. Our pans are small so we cooked about 3 or 4 ears at a time.


When they come out of the boiling water, they must be dropped in ice water to stop the cooking. Then we stood them up to dry.


Finally we cut the corn off the cob and packed 3 ears worth of corn in a freezer bag. Squished the air out and sealed it shut.
Here's our 23 bags of corn, stacked in the freezer! That's enough for fresh corn once or twice a month all year long!


Strawberry Freezer Jam:

Nana also makes the best strawberry freezer jam. I've been wanting to try this out for a couple of years, but just never got around to it. I actually bought strawberries earlier in the week, but some unexpected things happened and I didn't get to it until it was too late. Michael had to toss them. So today I started over, with a new batch of strawberries.

First I cut the tops off the strawberries and dropped them in my very favorite kitchen appliance, my food processor. : ) A few quick pulses and I had chopped strawberries. I mixed them with the sugar and let it sit for 10 minutes while I boiled 3/4 cup of water and a package of sure-gel.

After the sure-gel boiled, I combined it with the fruit and poured it into pint sized jars. All done! Easy enough. Now they sit for 24 hours and then go into the freezer.


As I was putting the extra lids away, I noticed a recipe for salsa on the back of the box. As much as Michael loves salsa, I may have to try that next. Although, I'm quickly running out of room in the freezer!