If you live in the Central Valley of California, where we are located, we are about to get our first roasting of the summer. Later this week it will get into the 100's and even above 108⁰ in some places.

I love the summer. All the fresh fruits and veggies grown in our valley make this a great time for home preservation.

If you are a jam and jelly maker this is your season. You wait all year long for this plethora of fruits. In April we conducted a workshop on freezing and dehydrating. We especially focused on freezing fruits. With a little research you can discover how to make fruit roll-ups for your children and grandchildren via dehydration.

In May we held a workshop on berries and gave some recipes on Chocolate raspberry sauce, a berry BBQ sauce and berry Hand pies (we included a pastry recipe as well).

While they are still in season, on our website, you can find information about cherries. How to make a Cherry Marmalade or a Black Forest Cherry jam.

This month, June, we are covering Stone fruits in our monthly workshop. With stone fruits you can freeze, dehydrate, can in a light syrup or, if you must, make a jam or preserve. One of our members once gave us a recipe for Peach BBQ sauce. Mmmmmm sweet and tangy!

And as a heads up, July's workshop will be all about pickling and not just cucumbers.

If you want to find what we have on our website regarding past workshops or videos, please go to: Workshop Archive .

If you want to register for this Saturday's, June 19, workshop please go to:

Peaches. apricots, cherries and more. We're going to talk about stone fruits. What are they and how can you preserve them? We will also talk about the different ways you can use preserved stone fruits.

Register in advance for this meeting:

https://ucanr.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJEtduurrDgtHNZHFiFhkprd1FD3MPdCjXve

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

Enjoy your summer and all the produce it has to offer!

*photo credit to Leite's Culinaria