The Pantry & Preserving Handbook

There is a particular comfort in a well-filled pantry — in rows of gleaming jars catching the autumn light, each one a small act of faith against the winter ahead. I have been making preserves for more than fifty years, and I can tell you honestly that the pleasure never diminishes. If anything, it deepens. This little handbook contains everything I have learnt in those years — from my mother's kitchen in Shropshire, from neighbours who pressed recipes into my hands, from failures that taught me more than any success ever could. I have written it for anyone who wishes to fill their shelves with something honest and homemade, who wants their larder to speak of care and abundance rather than haste. May these pages serve you as faithfully as the preserves themselves.

A full larder is a quiet kind of wealth. When the orchard is heavy and the hedgerows bright, I preserve — and all winter long I open a jar and taste September again. Preserving frightens people, but it needn't. It asks only for clean jars, a little patience, and the willingness to try. I have written down my safest, most trusted methods so that you may line your own shelves with rows of amber and ruby, and never waste the season's bounty again.

— Agnes