You can never have enough...

[Oh_hunnihunni]

I loved bottling. I was raised with the whole ritual of it, from growing, to trekking out to the orchards to lug wooden crates of fruit home to the newspaper spread table to prep. Then building the shelves along the back of the kitchen bench, bricks and planks, set at the right spacing to take the small jars for cherries and mandarins - and later trout fillets, and the tall jars for fruit and beans and tomatoes. Jams, pickles, sauces, we got competitive my Mum and I. We sought out new recipes, found more jars, and finally each had a wall of jewel coloured glassed deliciousness going in to winter.

For all the work, all the mess, I really miss those days. Maybe that is why my pantry consisters of bare wood planks bearing big red and green lidded Mansion House coffee jars with all my sugars and flours and tea bags and pasta and cereals and all the rest. And I love them. I cannot to this day resist a big glass jar...

And if it has a red lid? All the more tempting.