RIGHT IN TIME FOR THE IMPENDING FIRST DAY OF SUMMER, the vegetable garden is at that precipitous moment: Suddenly, production rate has gone from little early spring surprises gobbled up in delight, to more but still manageable, to—uh-oh!—an impending onslaught you can’t keep up with, with more, more, more to come. Seems like the best book giveaway right now would offer my favorite references on canning, preserving, freezing—all the ways to put up the harvest for delicious future reference. A roundup of my own tactics, and two chances to win “Stocking Up III,” “Putting Foods By” and the USDA guide to home canning:

You can win one of two, three-book sets that I’ve purchased to share as prizes—no, not my old food-splattered copies, above, but new ones. Promise! All you have to do to have a chance in the truly random drawing (I’ll use the tool at random [dot] org to pick a winner) is comment below, and be a subscriber to my email newsletter. All the details are at the end of this post.

Your comment should simply tell us what you like to put up for later from your garden or the farmer’s market—and it can be as simple as a sentence or include a recipe or a link to one; up to you.

Tips and Tricks:

Immediate ideas and tips on coping with the harvest can be had from these articles:

• What’s in My Freezer at Harvest Time: a Roundup of Ideas
• Making Pesto: Garlicky Green Ice Cubes
• Growing and Storing a Year of Parsley (good for many other green herbs, too)
• Dan Koshansky’s Hand-Me-Down Refrigerator Pickles
• Vegetable Curry-in-a-Hurry
• ‘Love Apple’ Sauce (Tomato!), and Real Applesauce
• All my recipes and cooking-related posts to date
• All my posts to date on growing and using vegetables, fruits and herbs

Elsewhere, sound, free information on food preserving:

• The National Center for Home Food Preservation has online help and pdf-style fact sheets and bulletins that may have the answers you need.
• Purdue University’s pdf publications on food safety, including topics like freezing fruits and vegetables, jams and jellies, and much more. Scroll down to the publications links list.

How to Enter:

Entries close midnight Thursday, June 24, with winners announced Friday.

For a chance in the truly random drawing (I’ll use the tool at random [dot] org to pick the two winners) you must comment below and be a subscriber to my email newsletter.

It’s easy to sign up for the latter if you haven’t already, and free, and here’s what it’s like in case you are worried I’m a spammer.

After I draw the winner, I’ll verify that he or she is, in fact, a subscriber…if not, I’ll draw again.

I know, that Margaret, she always wants something, right? Well, not really—there are no ads here or anything; I’ve done this for free for more than two years. (Truth be told, I do it for my mental health, and you are all part of the therapy.) But I love seeing our community grow, and the newsletter helps make that happen. Now back to the garden, and the kitchen…