If you need some advice or inspiration to learn what to do with the harvest you bring home, start by taking a look at these titles.
Still the best go-to out there would have to be The Big Book of Preserving the Harvest: 150 Recipes for Freezing, Canning, Drying and Pickling Fruits and Vegetables.Carol Costenbader gives you everything you need to get started, or fresh ideas when you’ve been preserving produce for years. – KN
Artichokes to zucchini, the Vermont farmer and chef Laura Sorkin offers fascinating facts on 50 vegetables and then follows with mouthwatering recipes for snacks, soups, salads, sides and entrees in Vegetables: The Ultimate Cookbook. – WW
The forever popular Wild Fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods by the fermentation guru Sandor Katz. “The book that started the fermentation movement” will be all you need to understand the chemistry, get started with success, and then branch out into amazingly delicious recipes. – KN
Try The Great Big Pumpkin Cookbook: A Quick and Easy Guide to Making Pancakes, Soups, Breads, Pastas, Cakes, Cookies, and More by Maggie Michalczyk. The book itself really isn’t that big, but pumpkins of any size, jack-o-lanterns included, can go into the 50 recipes from the creator of the “Once Upon A Pumpkin” blog. – WW
For absolute pure inspiration, to get creative ideas for next year, you must hold a copy of Spirit of Place: The Making of a New England Garden. Bill Noble, from Norwich, Vt., and former director of the Garden Conservancy, leads us into how our gardens can be a reflection of its special place in this landscape and our need for a spirit of place. Each page is loaded with gorgeous pictures and ideas. – KN
The Farm Girl’s Guide to Preserving the Harvest: How to Can, Freeze, Dehydrate, and Ferment Your Garden’s Goodness by Ann Accetta-Scott, a Washington State homesteader, offers clear and well-illustrated guidance in a progression of techniques from newcomers to advanced preservers. – WW
And how about getting the kids excited about planning next year’s garden with How to Grow a School Garden: A Complete Guide for Parents and Teachers from the San Francisco Green Schoolyard Alliance. Everything to get you started and to get the kids planning, turning book knowledge into real experience, fun and lifetime skills. – KN
Check outThe Complete Guide to Saving Seeds: 322 Vegetables, Herbs, Fruits, Flowers, Trees, and Shrubs by Robert E. Gough and Cheryl Moore-Gough. It’s harvest time and seeds are abundant. Here’s how to gather, store, and successfully propagate 322 vegetables, herbs, flowers, trees, and shrubs. – WW
The Apple Lover’s Cookbook: Revised and Updated by Amy Traverso organizes 70 apple varieties into four categories —firm-tart, tender-tart, firm-sweet, and tender-sweet and then provides more than 100 scrumptious, easy-to-make recipes, offering the full range from breakfast dishes, appetizers, salads, soups, and entrees all the way to desserts. – WW
(Katharine Nevins is co-owner of MainStreet BookEnds of Warner, an independent, family-run, community bookstore since 1998. Willard Williams is owner of Toadstool Bookshops founded in 1972 with locations in Peterborough, Keene and Nashua.)