Welcome!
This site is dedicated to urban homesteading, specifically the practice of growing and preserving food. This is achievable at pretty much any scale—I’m on a small suburban property, not a large rural acreage. Even at this small scale, we’re able to grow and preserve a year’s worth of food every summer.
This site is a growing collection of food preservation and country wine recipes, with a smattering of other projects of interest to urban homesteaders, like sourdough bread baking. You’ll find the full list of recipes here.
You can also learn more about me, my food preservation journey, and more about what urban homesteading means to me.
Latest Posts
How to Can Apple Juice (Updated Recipe)
Apples are often considered a fall treat, but for us, they're right in the middle of summer. We don't have ...
How to Pressure Can Peas
I'm often asked why I choose to can certain foods when they could just as easily be frozen. My answer ...
How to Make Gnocchi
Potatoes are one of those harvests that are both incredibly easy to preserve, but also strangely difficult. If all you ...
Water Bath Canner Recipes
How to Can Apple Juice (Updated Recipe)
Apples are often considered a fall treat, but for us, they're right in the middle of summer. We don't have ...
How to Make Delicious Homemade Rhubarb Jelly: A Step-by-Step Guide
Rhubarb is one of those plants where if you have it, you have a ton of it. We don't actually ...
How to Make and Can Cranberry Juice (Three Methods)
My husband and I had high hopes of making it out to a provincial park this fall to forage for ...
Pressure Canner Recipes
How to Pressure Can Peas
I'm often asked why I choose to can certain foods when they could just as easily be frozen. My answer ...
How to Pressure Can Black Beans: A Step-by-Step Guide
Now that things are really calming down around here—the fall harvest has nearly all been processed, the holiday season is ...
How to Can Chicken (Raw Pack Method)
I'm sure many of you had a reaction when reading the title "How to Can Chicken". For many folks, I'm ...
Preserving Vegetables Recipes
How to Pressure Can Peas
I'm often asked why I choose to can certain foods when they could just as easily be frozen. My answer ...
How to Make Gnocchi
Potatoes are one of those harvests that are both incredibly easy to preserve, but also strangely difficult. If all you ...
How to Make Chive Blossom Vinegar
Chives are one of the first plants to come up in the garden every year. They have a lovely aroma ...
Dehydrator Recipes
How to Dry Chamomile Flowers for Tea
This year in the garden has seen us expand into other areas beyond simply preserving vegetables and fruit. We’ve been ...
How to Make Dandelion Coffee
Several years ago, a strange plant appeared in our garden. We have a habit of letting these things grow, to ...
Two Ways to Dry Hot Peppers (and What to Do With Them!)
In summer of 2022, I tried growing hot peppers for the first time. We had a few jalapeño pepper plants, ...
Bread & Sourdough Discard Recipes
How to Make Sourdough Pizza
It seems I've really gotten into a sourdough kick over the past couple months. I've baked some bread, made English ...
How to Make Sourdough Discard Crackers
We hosted a dinner party recently and it evolved into a potluck where our guests were bringing the salad, sides, ...
How to Make Sourdough English Muffins
Continuing with my seasonal shift in homesteading—winter and early spring being prime time for sourdough and other baking projects—this past ...
Condiments, Dips, and Spreads
How to Make Chive Blossom Vinegar
Chives are one of the first plants to come up in the garden every year. They have a lovely aroma ...
How to Make Delicious Homemade Rhubarb Jelly: A Step-by-Step Guide
Rhubarb is one of those plants where if you have it, you have a ton of it. We don't actually ...
How to Make Bread and Butter Pickles
I've heard it said that in every relationship, there's one person who loves pickles and one person who hates pickles, ...
Alcoholic Drinks
How to Make Rhubarb Ginger Gin
It's just about rhubarb season here! Some folks are already harvesting theirs but for some reason the plants on our ...
How to Make Grapefruit Soju
When I hang out with my friend group, we like to try to pair food or drinks to what we're ...
How to Make Orange Soju
Soju is a Korean spirit that I liken to a lighter vodka—it has little to no taste and usually comes ...
Country Wine Recipes
How to Make Corn Cob Wine
We rarely buy wine anymore. It started innocently enough — my first batch of garden wine (or country wine, as ...
How to Make Rhubarb Wine
When my husband and I started on our journey of urban homesteading, it was pretty basic. He wanted to grow ...
A Rough Guide to Making Country Wines
Country wines are generally wines made with fruit other than grapes. Considering these wines are usually the output of my ...
Gardening and Harvesting
Berry Bonanza: A July 2025 Garden Update
The weather this spring and early summer was a bit weird. It got super hot in the daytime (far too ...
5 Easy Crops for the Beginner Gardener
We recently had some people over and they saw our garden for the first time. Their question — and everyone ...
Summer is Finally Here: A Garden Update for June 2025
It's almost hard to believe that less than a month ago, the ground was all black earth and we were ...
General Blog Posts
Berry Bonanza: A July 2025 Garden Update
The weather this spring and early summer was a bit weird. It got super hot in the daytime (far too ...
5 Easy Crops for the Beginner Gardener
We recently had some people over and they saw our garden for the first time. Their question — and everyone ...
Summer is Finally Here: A Garden Update for June 2025
It's almost hard to believe that less than a month ago, the ground was all black earth and we were ...