WIN Free time in our kitchens

In November of 2014 when we opened the doors at Manning Canning Kitchens, we honestly had no idea what to expect. In the past 16 months we have seen some truly inspiring food entrepreneurs pass through our doors. From prepped meal companies such as Chowdy, who started in our kitchen making 200 meals a week who have grown so much they are graduating at the end of April into their very own facility. To our friends at Bombay Street Food who started with a stall at East York Farmer's market and in April are opening their very own restaurant on Bay Street.

When I started my preserves business, I quickly discovered that the biggest barrier to my growth was going to be access to commercial kitchen space. I was very fortunate to find East Scarborough Storefront and get access to 4 free hours a week in their wonderful commercial kitchen and when I graduated from there, I went to the kitchen of my local butcher shop, who gave me access to their steam kettles at a ridiculously fair rate. Without both of these wonderful finds, I am not sure my business would be today.

So we decided we wanted to give back to the wonderful food community that supported us when we were just getting started by giving away free time in our kitchen.

The contest will be judged by an all star cast of food entrepreneurs, including Matt Basile (Fidel Gastro Street Food Co.), Erin Maynes (Foodiepages.ca), Cheryl Appleton (Canadian Women in Food), Kim Antonius (Pitchfork Company/Fairmount Park Farmers Market) and Peter Neal (Neal Brothers Food Inc.)

To enter click here

The Canning Kitchen

It was a lovely surprise last Friday when a package arrived at my kitchen from Penguin Random House Canada. I immediately tore it open to find this lovely new preserving book inside by Amy Bronee, blogger and author of this lovely canning cookbook. Thank you Random House for thinking of me!

I had an upcoming preserving class at Le Dolci, so thought what better way to test drive a new cookbook than to use one of the recipes with my students. Asparagus are in season, so the Pickled Asparagus Spears Recipe seemed like the obvious choice.

It was a gorgeous Saturday morning and in the class we were going to make Strawberry Balsamic Jam and Pickled Asparagus.

We started off with the Pickled Asparagus for a couple of reasons. One because I love how pickling shows new preservers how simple the whole process can be and that it does not have to be a time consuming or labour intensive. I shared with the class a couple tips with making pickled asparagus.

1. I like to draw lines on my cutting board that show me the different lengths to cut items depending on my jar size. This makes the prep process so much easier.
2. I arrange my spears with tips pointing all in one direction in rows so that you can grab your product quickly and easily when it comes to filling the jars

The class was excited to hear that we were using a new recipe and instagram and tweets were being sent all throughout the class. We even got Amy engaged all the way from Victoria.

Before they knew it the Asparagus was in the jars with their spices and brine and were ready for the hot water bath. Amy's recipe has a nice little twist in that it uses fennel instead of some of the more popular combination of dill and mustard seeds. I imagine when the class opens their jars in the recommended 2-4 weeks that they will be thrilled with the flavour combination.

I look forward to trying a few of the other simple small batch recipes in this cookbook throughout the summer months. If you are interested in getting your hands on The Canning Kitchen the release date is June 9th, 2015 or you can pre-order it here.

Toronto Rental Commercial Kitchen

It started as a dream 3 years ago and over the past 6 months we have been working hard to make it a reality. A rental kitchen in Toronto where small food producers, chefs, caterers, etc could bake, preserve or create.

Why did I want to open up a commercial kitchen? You may not know this but all food that is produced in Toronto and made available for sale HAS to be produced in a certified commercial kitchen that has been inspected by the City of Toronto. And when I started my preserves company, I quickly discovered that these types of kitchens were very hard to find. It quickly became the biggest challenge in my business and as I spoke with other producers that I met at food shows and farmer's markets, I realized I wasn't alone.

I was very lucky that I found the East Scarborough Storefront and for just over a year I was able to use their fabulous kitchen once a week at NO CHARGE to make my jams, jellies and pickles. And if you happen to live in the KGO (Kingston, Galloway, Orton Park) area you should definitely acquaint yourselves with all of the wonderful work they do and the amazing services they provide. 

And then I got lucky for a 2nd time; one of the stores that carries my products allowed me to use the kitchen in their basement. SCORE! It had 2 - 10g steam kettles and really allowed me to increase my productivity and batch up my recipes.

But even with access to these 2 wonderful kitchens, which is more than a lot of food producers manage to find, it was limited and my business could not grow fast enough to keep up with demand. My husband and I knew it was time to really push ahead on our dream of Toronto's rentable commercial kitchen space.

But building a commercial kitchen is EXPENSIVE and we knew we would need some help making it a reality. So in late September we launched our kickstarter campaign. We reached our goal (thank you, thank you, thank you) and it has been full speed ahead ever since.

Below shows you some of the blood, sweat and tears that have gone into the space.

The very first step was to ensure that the floor in the main kitchen space was food space. This involved degreasing the existing floor, sanding it down, and painting it several times with a food safe apoxy that left it shining.

The existing space was set up as a cafe/coffee shop so we started by tearing out their seating, removing the 3 pc bathroom and building the great wall of canning.

Progression of the space from cafe to 2nd rental kitchen and Manning Canning production space

During the construction, we were also sourcing all of the equipment for the kitchen, buying expensive transformers, working with master electricians, dealing with water outages. But each hurdle we came up against, and each hurdle we jumped took us that much closer to the finished product.

The hunt for the equipment

Today for the first time after many months of hard work, set backs, picking ourselves up all over again, painting and then painting some more along with a few other things thrown in there for good measure - my team and I worked in the brand new kitchen for the first time.

And it was GLORIOUS! We didn't have to carry all of the ingredients and tools we needed down a flight of stairs and soon I will transfer all of my preserving tools into the kitchen and I will be able to walk from my vehicle to the kitchen with nothing but my keys in my hand.

And the great thing is that we have created a space that makes this possible for other people as well. It has been amazing being able to see and SMELL all of the wonderful goodies the people using our kitchen have created.

Producers putting the kitchen to the test