Vinegar to make your tastebuds sing

This is one of the loveliest photos in all my albums. This is chive flower vinegar.

If your garden — or weed patch, as the case may be — is anything like ours, you can't keep up with the chives. They're the first welcome little green things as the snow disappears (around the same time as the crocuses) and before you know it, they're a runaway crop and try as you might, you can't think of another way to use them.

Then the beautiful flowers appear.

It's time for you to act.

Pack some of the beautiful flowers into Mason jars.

Pour white vinegar into the jars to fill them up.

When it's a gorgeous pinky-red colour, strain it through cheese-cloth into pretty bottles.

It has a chive-y, onion-y flavour and so goes nicely in any vinaigrette or simply drizzled over your fresh salad. It can be used in all sorts of creative ways as, of course, all vinegars can. And certainly, if you make a lot, be sure and offer a bottle to your friends.

I love vinegar. I have a pretty little shelf over my stove and although I've tried to keep just the coarse salt cellar and the mortar & pestle up there, this is what it looks like now. It happens, gradually:

The vinegars that didn't make it for the photo shoot but are in regular rotation are the apple cider, rice, plain white, malt and sage — which we've made the same way we made the chive flower: stuff sage leaves into Mason jars instead of chive flowers.

I'm pretty sure I use vinegar every day, in one way or another. Some of the obvious uses — pickles, for instance. . .

. . .are just once or twice a year.

Other obvious uses are in salad dressings and marinades. But just as I agree with that TV chef (I can't remember which one it was) who said there's almost nothing that won't be improved by a squeeze of fresh lemon juice, I also think that a splash of lovely vinegar brightens up any dish and makes the flavours pop. I use it to de-glaze a pan. I add it to onions, celery, carrots and garlic as they're softening to begin a sauce. I use it when the drippings are simmering down during the gravy-making. I use it making the base for soups and stews. The dinner I made today (a biscuit-topped pasta casserole) used tomato sauce I had made earlier in the week — a tomato sauce that had vinegar as one of its secret ingredients.

Often when you use vinegar like this, it will need a little counter-acting. You can throw in a bit of brown sugar or maple syrup. And if you look back at the bottles above my stove, you'll see a bottle labelled "Clic." It's pomegranate molasses — it was bought by mistake, I think — and a dash of it in with a tasty vinegar is a lovely combination.

Some of the ways I've described using vinegar are also the ways you probably use wine in cooking. I use wine also; it adds a deep rich flavour but there are times I prefer the effect vinegar has. It just really wakes up your tastebuds.

This is a favourite cookbook. It has good reading in it as well as recipes. I hadn't looked at it for awhile and I'm happy to say I've just seen a new recipe for peaches — which, by late August, I'll be looking for again if our peach tree has its usual good yield. I'll go right now and mark it on the calendar.

A peachy way to spend the day

We moved into this house 17 years ago. (I’ve now lived here longer – much longer – than I’ve lived anywhere else in my life.)

It was September when we arrived and we looked out into the backyard and there was a peach tree – a fully-loaded peach tree. I had no idea such a thing could thrive in downtown Halifax but there it was.

We had to settle in to our new home but – as we’ve learned since, every Fall – when peaches are ready to be picked, you’ve gotta pick them.

That year, our first experience as peach-tree-owners, we picked – this is the truth – 30 dozen peaches. We had bowls and basins overflowing with them.

They were delicious and we ate lots of them but it soon became obvious that we’d have to start processing and preserving. Thus began our long and ongoing relationship with the peach and all its many possibilities.

When I came downstairs this morning, Dan was quite far along in extracting juice to make peach jelly. We made it for the first time last year and I think we’ll now happily add it to our all-time list.

A few days ago, Dan had already made peach conserve, a delicious preserve that includes, besides peaches, chopped oranges with peel, almonds, candied ginger and spices. We’ve made conserve before and it’s always a favourite.

Over the years, we’ve also made a variety of peach jams, chutney and spiced whole peaches. The chutney is delectable and I often serve it at Thanksgiving and Christmas, with the turkey dinner. Of course, we also serve it with curries and it goes nicely with the tourtière on Christmas Eve.

The demise of our peach tree is predicted every year – it’s pretty old for a fruit tree, apparently – but it’s still going strong. It has good years and other not-so-good years although I don’t think we’ve ever missed a year of preserving. It’s just that some years we do more than others.

So we’ll continue to give it tender loving care; we’ll prune it when necessary and prop it up with the step ladder when its branches get too heavy to hold themselves up. We’ll try to keep the clothes on the line from catching on the branches and we’ll fertilize responsibly.

We’ll do our best for the peach tree and after all this time, we’ll surely go into mourning when its fruitfulness comes to an end.