For a long time vegetables and fruits were purchased from various supermarkets and made into drinkable juice using a blender. A liter or so was consumed daily. The belief being that most of the nutrients were utilized.
Eventually I acquired a superb piece of property upon which I could grow much produce. The problem was the abundance all appeared during the two months of Summer harvest in my Zone 5. I decided upon preserving this abundance, but how? Experimenting I decided to utilize pressure canning as the primary method.
Summary of the method was: Wash, cut into smaller pieces, cook in their own juices or add water to make a drinkable texture. Beat into a slurry using a portable hand blender, strain through a 2 mm mesh food mill, place the slurry or juice in liter jars and pressure can at 15 PSI for 15 minutes. The end product would keep for long periods at room temperate. I would process all plant produce and acquire about 500 liter jars for the Season. A typical example of the Pressure canning method.
http://durgan.org/2016/August%... 25 August 2016 Tomato Celery Juice
Fifty pound of tomatoes and five pounds of celery were taken from the garden and processed into 17 liters of pressure canned juice. About ten pounds of the tomatoes were selected for table use. The juice was pressure canned at 15 PSI for 15 minutes for long term storage at room temperature. Annotated pictures depict in more detail the process.
During the off season a liter or more would be consumed daily. To my astonishment over time it was determined that the nutrients were considerably more than the same produce prepared in raw form.
Now I am an advocate of cooked versus raw without reservations.
This is one method upon which my diet is based. Other foods and methods were added over time utilizing an experimental system. In other words my diet was completely exchanged from the conventional with what I consider positive results. I keep a record of the methods and post it in my Garden Journal. Another motive for this action is an awareness of the world wide obesity epidemic. My small contribution to solving the problem.
http://durgan.org/2011/ The Garden Journal.
