July 2010

Harvests from backyard and community gardens must be in full swing because lately, we've been getting a lot of inquiries about canning salt! Since our co-op does not carry canning salt, below are a couple of tips and recommended substitutes. You can find 3 lb. boxes of Kosher salt in our meat department. pickling salt = canning salt = canning and pickling salt Canning or pickling salt is similar to table salt, but lacks the iodine and anti-caking additives that turn pickles dark and the pickling liquid cloudy. Pickles made with table salt would still be good to eat, but they wouldn't look as appetizing. Pickling salt is available in large bags or boxes in some supermarkets, but sometimes hard to find in cities. Substitutes: Kosher Salt (Since it's not as dense as pickling salt, you'll need to use more, but follow directions on package or use a recipe that has measurements for

Many people envision healthy nutritious eggs to be those raised organically or naturally with free-range pastured hens, but have you ever thought about what happens after the eggs are collected? Recently some alert members spotted an article on this very topic and were concerned by what they read. Eggs need to be porous, allowing air to pass through to the inside of the egg so that it can breathe, yet at the same time the egg is protected from bacterial invasion by a natural waxy coating called the bloom. Commercial industry practice is to wash eggs thoroughly. On the surface this appears to be a positive thing, but as they say, the devil is in the details. Unfortunately, this washing removes the bloom, opening the egg to infection. To compensate for this, commercial industry practice is to replace the bloom with a mineral