We are heading to a challenge this afternoon. The challenge comes from the bounty of the place where we live. We spent part of an afternoon at a you-pick berry farm gathering strawberries. We ate lots of fresh strawberries. Susan made strawberry pie. And we froze bags of the berries for use during the off-season. Next, the cherries on the tree in our yard began to ripen. We have to pick the cherries aggressively because the tree attracts birds who get their share of berries each year. We are almost to the end of cherry season. Again, we get pie and we eat fresh berries. And we add bags of berries to our freezer. Now raspberries are ready for you to pick, and we plan to gather a few buckets of the delicious berries this afternoon. Our freezers are already quite full, and we’re going to have to engage in some freezer engineering to make everything fit.

The crowding in the freezer isn’t just fruit. We stocked up on frozen food at a local food warehouse this week in anticipation of a visit from our daughter and her family. We want to have lots of food on hand so that we can prepare meals without having to do much shopping while they are here. The time came for processing the cows at the farm, and their freezers are full of beef. We also participated in that bounty, adding to our freezer. And we freeze a few vegetables. Peas were especially prolific this year. We’ve got a large bag of them that need to be shelled, blanched, and frozen in the next couple of days.

The freezers are full, and we’ve got berries coming. A certain amount of space can be obtained by careful organization. We tend to open the freezer and add things when we're in the midst of a berry harvest. Now is a good time to go through the appliance and remove a few items to make space. “Hmm . . . there is half a cheesecake. It would be good with fresh berries. Let’s put it into the refrigerator to thaw. I’ll taste a little slice right now.” Carefully stacking bags of frozen berries can save a bit of space. We try hard to avoid wasting food, but there are probably a few things in the corners of the freezer that have been left there a bit too long.

The real challenge for us is soup. We participated in hosting a soup supper at the church a few weeks ago, and overprepared. We ended up with a large bucket of African Peanut Soup and another of lentil soup. Instead of freezing them in smaller containers, we put two large containers into the freezer simply because we were tired after working at the church meal. We’ve avoided taking them out of the freezer because it means having the same menu for several meals in a row to avoid wasting the soup. Something tells me today is the first of several soup days at our house, even though soup seems like more of a winter food than a summer one. We don’t often heat a bowl of soup and then sit outside on the deck to eat it.

All of that bounty is a luxury, and we know it. There are people in our community who are hungry. Children are living with nutritional insecurity. We have no reason to complain.

Our methods of food preservation differ significantly from those of previous generations. We don’t can at our house. Our grandparents and parents saved mason jars, carefully washed them, and filled them with cooked food. The heated contents were placed into the jars, and a top with a rubber seal was secured in place with a metal ring. The cooling food inside the jar contracted, creating a seal. The jars can be stored in a pantry or other designated area for easy access when needed. It involves a lot of work and a hot kitchen in the summer. We’ve been a bit more lazy, allowing the freezer to preserve our food.

Our son and his family invested in a freeze dryer this year. It is an amazing appliance, and they have had success preserving a variety of different foods. Some foods can be reconstituted using a bit of warm water. Other foods are eaten just as they come out of the freeze dryer. The children eat freeze-dried berries almost as fast as the machine can process them.

There is one food from the farm that requires no special preservation. The bees do all the work with the honey, and by the time we harvest it, all that is needed is separating it from the wax and pouring it into jars. Unlike almost every other food, honey is not susceptible to bacterial contamination that results in mould and spoilage. The process of making the sweet substance is fascinating. Bees harvest nectar from flowers. On the flowers, the warm, watery, sugary fluid is just right to attract bacteria and begin to spoil. However, the bees start to treat the nectar as they fly. They remove some of the water from the nectar through the fanning of their wings. They also infuse enzymes from their bodies into the nectar, which raises its acidity. Acid discourages the growth of certain microorganisms. It is the same principle as using vinegar to preserve by pickling, without the tangy flavor. The result is that by the time the nectar is delivered to the hive, it has already begun a dramatic transformation. The complex sugars in the nectar are broken down into simpler ones.

When nectar reaches the hive, it is deposited in wax chambers, and the bees continue to process the precious food. They fan it with their wings. The fanning causes the remaining water to evaporate. Nectar, when taken from flowers, is 70% to 80% water. When the bees cap the cells with wax, the processed honey is between 15% and 18% water. The sugar in honey is far more concentrated than any syrup made by dissolving sugar in water.

The bees are frugal and make more honey than they need. I harvest a portion of that honey and put it into jars. Honey can crystallize, becoming even thicker, but can be reconstituted easily by placing the jar in hot water. I use a slow cooker on its lowest setting.

I’m grateful to the bees for doing all the work to provide us with one food that doesn’t require space in the freezer.