Member Reviews

The Farm Girl's Guide to Preserving the Harvest is an easy to follow instructional guide that will show you the process from start to finish. You will learn about canning, freezing, dehydrating your food amongst other things.

If you are interested in learning any of these techniques, then this is the book for you.

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Excellent resource!! We're not homesteaders, but I still learned so much from this book that I will be able to use. This book is a really great resource for anyone wanting to preserve homegrown produce or even produce/meats purchased on sale, homesteader or not. This book does not contain a lot of recipes (there are several throughout the book), so it's not really a cookbook. Instead, it has a lot of background and instruction on different food-preservation methods, with explanations on how to best use these methods. It's broken into 8 chapters and is full of so much information, on preservation methods I am already familiar with and use and also on methods I'm not as familiar with. While this is not a complete guide for all the methods listed, it is full of extremely useful information on each method, a few recipes to use for the different methods throughout the book, as well as resources on how to find more information and products (canners, salt for curing, sourdough starter, etc.). The author also refers the reader a lot to manufacturers' instruction manuals and websites for university extensions in your area, for information specific to your products and area. There are tons of helpful charts to refer to for easy reference for brines, ratios, cooking times, etc. I anticipate using this book as I expand my home food storage methods and which foods I preserve that I haven't tried before. I do wish the photos were labeled, as some of them I wanted to know more about what foods they were portraying. That said, the photos are beautiful and do add to the recipes and methods they are placed next to. I just wasn't always sure what the picture was of at times. There were places I wish had more step-by-step instructions for things rather than in paragraph form, but I still think I will be able to refer back to the information included in this book and find it easily as needed. I look forward to trying some new methods, expanding my canning, and trying out a few of the included recipes (homemade dog treats and fermented eggs!??!!). There are things I've wanted to try and haven't dared. This book has given me the confidence to start trying them, and I'll definitely reach for it as I try new ways to preserve our food and add to our food storage!

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Cute book! I even learned some new things about preserving!! My friends were so jealous and want this book now!

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As someone who has never canned anything in her life I was excited about this book. I have always been more than a little intimated about trying this. My younger sister does it every year and she acts like it is no big deal. This book is the ideal tool for someone like me.

I would love to say it is perfect for someone who has more experience for the recipes alone.Which by the way are awesome! This book gives you all the basics on canning, dehydrating, freezing, fermenting, curing, and smoking, plus how to use the right tools for each method. If you want to learn more about preserving this this book needs to be in your collection.

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I loved this book - this year was the first year I had a truly successful garden and I've been putting up produce as it comes in!

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This is a great how-to guide for those who are new to preservation methods like pressure canning, water bath canning, drying, dehydrating and fermenting. These are all things that we have been doing for years but I am always open for more information and ideas. There are great photos and charts, plus very detailed information to get you started. I was hoping for more actual recipes and instructions, along the lines of "here are our favorite ways to put tomatoes, here are our favorite beet recipes, here are the basics on how to can, pickle or freeze green beans" and things like that. This isn't that kind of book and I already am pretty proficient at preservation, so it's not a book that I feel the need to buy for my own shelves. If I were new to all of this, it would definitely be on my short list.

My rating system:
1 = hated it
2 = it was okay
3 = liked it
4 = really liked it
5 = love it, plan to purchase, and/or would buy it again if it was lost

I read a temporary digital ARC of the book for the purpose of review.

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I grew up on a farm canning every summer with my grandma so this book really hit home for me. I loved the pictures and I loved the detailed how tos on preserving food. I live in a much more highly populated area now but still can't go a summer without at least making up some homemade jam to can. Food preservation is such an important skill as well as growing a garden to harvest. Beautiful book with wonderful content!

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The Farm Girl's Guide to Preserving is a very comprehensive book about preserving foods and just homesteading in general. I enjoyed the beginning story about how Ann and her family decided to go from your average American family to homesteading and living off the land. I was hoping for a book that would make preserving seem more simple to me, but I am thinking that maybe that just doesn't exist and it is just too complicated for me. I did, however, enjoy the recipes that appeared in the book.

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Completely fabulous! I've canned produce before, using the water bath method as well as a pressure canner, and I'm always interested in learning more about preserving my own food. This book is loaded - and I mean LOADED - with information on a variety of food preservation methods. Initially, I was thinking "get on with the recipes already!" but I quickly realized that there is nothing that should have been cut out of the beginning of the book; it's all important.

The author's enthusiasm for the topic is clear, and that makes the reader enthusiastic, as well. There's really no reason to be afraid to just jump in and start canning!

Sadly, with this being an ARC copy (thanks to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for allowing me to review this title!) it will go away in a few weeks. I plan to purchase a copy for myself and to recommend the title for my library. It's that good!

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Ann Accetta-Scott tells us that preserving the harvest is the scariest part of homesteading. I can't say she is wrong about that but with her guide to follow, it's a much more doable series of chores. The Farm Girls Guide to Preserving the Harvest is an excellent look into your options when/if that garden really starts to be viable. I retired a couple of years ago, and have time now to garden. I grew up on a farm in the 1950s with a large harvest - and a large extended family to handle the chores. My memories of a house full of Aunts and Grandma and Mom all laughing, peeling, giggling, chopping, are the best.

That world has passed, however, and gardening by myself is intimidating. My husband worked outdoors for 40 years and he has no interest in anything past the rocker on the back porch. My children have lives. But I really want to find again that sense of complete self-reliance and contentment that we had when I was a girl. It goes past food security. I think it is grounded in your sense of self-worth and perhaps self-confidence. I need to feel that, again.

My first two years after I retired, I grew only a bit more than we could eat over the course of the summer growing season. Last year I had vegetables to dehydrate which lasted most of the winter season. And last February, I lost my mother at 88. I need the garden now, more than ever.

Reading this excellent offering from Ms. Accetta-Scott has gotten me fired up - I will at the very least have plenty of tomatoes and peppers if I get started right away. And fermenting - my grandmother always had 6-gallon crocks of pickles and sauerkraut bubbling in the back of the pantry. And nobody made bread and butter pickles as crisp and sweet as hers. For we kids, the best part of autumn was getting involved in making chow-chow - basically pickling every green thing in the garden on the last Indian summer days before that first hard frost. We got to help - gather, wash, chop, spice. It felt so good to be a part of that, providing bits of summer to brighten winter days.

I will never be as good at food preservation as Grandma, who spent her 92 years of life taking care of her family, feeding them well balanced, wholesome meals. But with this little book, I might make it through one more summer of gardening. Sauerkraut may be beyond me, but I KNOW I can handle chow-chow!

I received a free electronic copy of this how-to book from Netgalley, Ann Accetta-Scott, and Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group. Thank you for sharing your hard work with me. I have read this book of my own volition, and this review is my honest opinion of this work.

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This book is great for beginners. This walks you through preserving food in a few different ways and is quite helpful if you are just starting out. Thank you to Netgalley fro the ARC.

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The Farm Girl’s Guide to Persevere the Harvest
by Ann Accetta-Scott

It’s the end of the season, and the garden is ready for picking. Now what to do with it all. This book will take you through many different techniques for preserving your food.

To get started, there are several specific items that you need to do canning. Once you invest in all the necessary items, you’ll be good to go for many years. Water canning and freezing are the 2 most common methods used for storing food. There are other methods that will require higher priced equipment like a dehydrator and a smoker.

What ever method you choose to use, you will find recipes and detailed instructions on how to persevere what vegetables you have on hand. You can start off with simple things like jams if your a beginner and work up all to handling meat with advanced methods. One important note is the section covering the best place to store your canned foods, which is in a cool basement.

I appreciated the photographs showing the produce and the canning process, and recipes.

As one who cans and dehydrates food, I found several recipes that I look forward to trying out this season.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

#Netgalley

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This was such a thorough, yet manageable guide to everything preservation! Ann clearly explains many different methods of canning, drying, fermenting, and guides you through the entire process. It is much less scary now, and I'm excited to start preserving some of my own harvest!

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The best time to read this book is when you are planning your garden and your farmer's market trips. before you are looking at a bushel basket of tomatoes with no idea of how to keep them. I'm always curious on how gardeners manage to plan their harvests and work towards a goal of keeping the crop that has matured all at once so they do not lose their efforts to Mother nature's whimsy.
The book gives practical information and guidance to anyone who is thinking of preserving. It covers several different methods with out making the reader/ user feel overwhelmed by information and technique. I have used all of these methods a little bit but feel I can apply the information provided to make my family's meals not only better but much safer too. A great book to read and refer to often.

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A wonderful guide to preserving the harvest. I had the privilege of reviewing this book through net galley. I intend to purchase and add it to my library.

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This is well laid-out, clear, concise and also beautiful. Now there are only two of us and we live in the city but oh, I so wish I had such a book when I was young.

Everything is explained. All of those things that died with so many of our grandmothers. Every list is available of how much to buy to be able to can a certain amount. I mean just everything is here. The pictures keep the reading flowing and the organization makes it as easy to use and it is easy to read.It's like a garden bible.

I think this should be on any cook's shelf if they have a garden or even buy produce at the farmer's markets each summer. It is a good book to begin to call a stand-by. This is just so interesting and even though it may no longer be the way I live or cook, it is something I loved reading.

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This book would be a fantastic resource for anyone who is interested in creating and preserving foods. It covers so much and goes so in depth that it makes things that seem complicated, quite easy to follow and tempting. This book covers the basic canning and freezing but also goes into other forms of preserving food such as smoking, fermenting, and free-drying. I loved that this book contains a plethora of preserving techniques and because everything is together, you would really only need this one book in your kitchen. I feel like this book offers more up-to-date instructions on preserving while incorporating techniques and products that you just don't see in older references. This book is a must-have for preserving food!

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This is a fabulous reference for canning, dehydrating, curing and smoking fish, fermenting, root cellar and cold storage, freezing and freeze-drying
Not only includes recipes but also the description of the tools needed. Many handy charts with pint and quart size processing times for different food items. Extra boxes explain rare questions and do-nots. Pictures galore!

Having relatives that can and having made a few things myself, I found this book to cover basics well and still teach me something new.

However, there were references to pages that weren't finished yet (XXX) and an empty spot with a note for a picture. The index wasn't finished. For a few things, the process was explained but not exact measurements/amounts.

I received a free ARC from Netgalley. Above is my opinion.

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I used to love canning and preserving food when I was a new mother. Not sure why I stopped, but it’s been awhile and I saw this title and figured it might spark the interest again. It did FAR more than that and opened up more doors and things for me to try.

A good overview many ways to put food up, this book makes it simple and provides recipes as well. It’s not just jellies and pickles, this book covers Ricotta, fruit roll ups, jerky, kombucha, Apple cider vinegar, Irish cream, and more.

A solid book for the amateur as well and experienced cook. Looking forward to getting a hard copy and putting up some of this Summer’s bounty.

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This book offers a great introduction and overview to home preserving with a wide variety of techniques and foods covered. It includes enough recipes to get you started and instructions on how to learn more, and importantly, it covers what you can and can't safely get creative about.

There are plenty of books out there with recipes for jams and jellies and pickles, but I found that the focus on using everything that one produces makes this a worthy book to add to your shelf, whether physical or digital.

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