Making jelly

For years I have enjoyed Jackie’s articles, recently bought her canning book and I have a question. In the past I’ve put my strawberries through my Victorio Strainer and would like to make jam/jelly out of the puree but haven’t been able to figure out the proportions of berry puree/sugar/and packs of SureJell and was wondering if Jackie ever made jam/jelly out of fruit puree.

Penny Haber
Cape May Court House, New Jersey

Just make your jam as if you were using the “crushed strawberries” in most jam recipes. That would work out to 5 cups crushed strawberries, 1/4 cup lemon juice, 7 cups sugar, and 1 pkg. powdered pectin. Use your instructions or check out the canning book (mine is great if I do say so myself; I use it too!). — Jackie

Growing wheat

I have been gardening for years, but have been thinking about raising wheat. I live in NW Arkansas and was wanting to know what kind of wheat I could plant now and if harvesting can be done fairly simply. We raised corn last year for cornmeal and am thinking about trying the wheat to make my own flour. And how much would I need to plant?

BA from the Ozarks.

Wheat’s a great idea. You should probably plant a good hard spring wheat for fall harvest. While a 50×10-foot plot will usually supply a family with wheat for a year, you can sure start smaller than that and still harvest considerable grain. To harvest it, you can easily cut it with a scythe or even pruning shears. I cut ours with a cordless hedge trimmer! Be sure it is very dry and golden so it is ripe throughout. Take your dry wheat sheaves and place them in a shallow child’s wading pool or on a clean plastic tarp. Then either whack the sheaves and heads with a plastic baseball bat, a clean stick or even walk on it with clean tennies. The grain falls out of the husks and it is easy to fork away the straw. The grain that is left can be winnowed by pouring it from one bowl to a lower one on a windy day. No wind? Use a box fan! You’ll love growing wheat! And eating the resulting breads. — Jackie

3 COMMENTS

  1. Stephanie

    About three pounds of wheat will easily plant a 10’x50′ plot. About the easiest way to plant it is to simply till the ground then lightly broadcast it on top of the soil. don’t get it too thick; an inch between seeds is about right. Then rake it in and walk on it to press it firmly into the soil. Water well and protect from birds and chickens. Wheat is very easy to grow.

    Jackie

  2. I have been curious about growing wheat too. How much seed would you need for a 10X50 plot and how do you plant it? I would love to know more.

  3. Jackie, thank you so much for the information on raising wheat! I had heard before that growing wheat wasn’t worth the effort but with the rising prices and possible shortages, growing wheat makes sense.

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