I went to a canning workshop at City Farmers Nursery this evening. The workshop was organized in part by San Diego Food Not Lawns. It took place at City Farmers Nursery and was presented by Bill Tall, the owner.

When I walked in to the house, my jaw practically dropped when I saw the kitchen. Just look at the photo and you'll get what I mean. But I'll add a few comments anyway.

• The kitchen is about the size of my condo.
• He has a super-sized (pardon the expression) stove, refrigerator, freezer, and dinning room table to go with the kitchen. He used to own a restaurant, so I guess it was hard to go back to regular household-sized equipment!
• All the counter tops are butcher block so you can cut right on them. He sands them down every few years to keep them nice.
• He keeps almost everything in his kitchen out where he can see it to make it easier to find and use. I've done this at my place to some extent over the past few years.

So, yes, I stumbled upon my dream kitchen... You'll notice some of these elements on a smaller scale in my kitchen ideas from last year.

Okay, enough about the kitchen, how do you can food?

You'll need canning jars, lids, bright yellow suspenders, screw top rings, and tongs or a jar grabber to pick up the hot jars. A large funnel like the one in the photo is very useful too. Start by preparing whatever you're going to put in the jar. We made peach jam. Peel peaches, cooked them with some liquid, add pectin, and mash them up.

Pectin is something that exists naturally in fruits. Apples, plums, oranges, are fruits high in pectin. Soft fruits like cherries, grapes, and strawberries contain little pectin. Long ago, people would mix fruits high in pectin in to the mix to make firmer jams. Later, pectin was extracted, mostly from apples, and then dried and made in to a powder. You can make jam without pectin if you are using pectin rich fruits. For fruits with little pectin, you can cook most of the liquid out, but your jam may still be runny or loose flavor and texture from cooking for a long time. So we added pectin to our peaches. Some pectin mixes have a lot of sugar while others don't. It will say on the package how much fruit and sugar to add. We stirred and mashed the peaches for about a half hour.

To prepare the jars, boil water in a large pot. Sterilize the jars and lids in the boiling water for a few minutes. Next, ladle the peach mixture in to the jars. Put the lid and screw top on each jar as it is filled, being careful not to touch them or you may contaminate the jars. Put the closed jars back in boiling water for about 10 minutes and then remove them. Some people skip this step and just turn their jars over for about 10 minutes, lid facing down. At some point, you will hear a popping sound when the lid is sucked firmly down on to the top of the jar as the contents cool. Let the jars cool overnight, then remove the screw top rings if you'd like. The lids will stay in place. Do not reuse the lids as they will not seal well a second time. Jars of jam last about a year, but you may want to eat them within six months so that they don't get runny or change flavor.

Okay, you might be able to make jam even if you don't have bright yellow suspenders, but I don't know if it will be as good as ours!

Here are more photos.