Apple butter, tested canning method
Apple butter is a smooth, concentrated apple preserve cooked with cider, vinegar, two sugars and spices, then hot-filled and processed in a boiling-water canner using the published jar-size and elevation schedule.
Salal berry cakes
salal cakes · salal berry cake
Salal berries pulped, formed into cakes and dried, a compact berry reserve of the northwestern American coast.
A berry reserve from the coast
Salal is a shrub of the northwestern American coast, and its dark berries were dried into cakes for storage. The cake form packs the fruit tightly and makes it easy to carry and keep.
The catalogue lists salal cakes beside fruit leathers from another region. Both show the same logic: pulp is dried so that a seasonal fruit lasts beyond its season.
Sources for this section
Pulp, shape and dry
The berries are pulped and formed into cakes before drying. The shape is the same mechanism as a leather sheet, with the pulp held in a compact mass rather than spread thin.
The catalogue gives no pulp ratios, forming method or drying time, so none is stated here.
Sources for this section
Keeping and use
A dry berry cake keeps much longer than the fresh fruit, but the sources do not establish a shelf life. Storage should keep the cakes dry, since moisture is what lets dried fruit spoil.
Use in the sources is as a stored food for later in the year rather than as a fresh fruit.
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What the record does not settle
The catalogue does not name the Indigenous nations or communities that made the cakes, and it gives no dates. A validated home drying method is not supplied.
Sources for this section
History
Salal cakes are one of the Indigenous North American forms of dried berry reserve. They sit beside Persian-style fruit leathers as ways of keeping fruit without a large addition of sugar.
Ingredients
Scaling: source batch only
Salal berriesRipe berries, pulped.
Amount not stated
Method
- Pulp the salal berries.
- Form the pulp into cakes.
- Dry the cakes until they are dry enough to store.
Places
Northwestern American coast
Traditional preparation · Region evidenceThe catalogue cites northwestern American salal cakes; it gives no narrower locality.
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Sources
Burke MuseumHistory · Method
Storage (Burke Museum)Northwestern American salal cakes
Cited in: A berry reserve from the coast; Keeping and use; What the record does not settle
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United NationsMethod
FAO fruit and berry processing (V5030E0j)Dried berry cakes as a fruit preservation form
Cited in: A berry reserve from the coast; Pulp, shape and dry