Barb Luthy’s pantry is filled with family favorites
LEBANON, MO. – Every cook has his or her specialty, the area in which they take a bit of extra pride. Barb Luthy of Laclede County, Mo., specializes in a pantry full of canned specialties from vegetables from her garden to fruits, like apple sauce and pie filling to meats, including sausage, chili, and beef stew as well as her own coffee creamer.
“At this time of year, I do fall themes, too, like baking pumpkin and pecan pies. For Thanksgiving, it’s a houseful, with 40 people here; 25 of those are just our own kids and grandchildren. And for Christmas, we do a Christmas Eve breakfast,” Barb explained.
A retired elementary teacher, Barb and her husband, Don have four daughters and two sons, and 14 grandchildren, ages 6 through 24.
With her canning and keeping a well-stocked pantry, Barb is carrying on a tradition passed down from her mother and grandmother.
“I’m a rebel canner,” she said adding she and others support one another via a website by the same name. “That means we don’t always do things exactly the way the experts and the USDA think we should but the truth is, if we were going to poison somebody by the way we do it, Mom and Grandma would have done that a long time ago.”
Barb’s pantry specialties include her family’s favorites, such as individual servings of cornbread, baked in small Mason jars to making her own vanilla extract and canning rendered lard.
“The kids just love the individual jars of cornbread, baked in the small jars. You can bake other recipes for canning, too, like pineapple upside down cake, by pouring the batter in the jars and setting them right on the oven rack to bake,” Barb said.
Growing up on a farm in Missouri, Barb learned to cook and can at home and by returning each summer for a week, to their family home in Indiana.
“I learned a lot from my grandparents,” she said. “Grandma taught me how to butcher chickens and Grandpa taught us about gardens and flowers. My Auntie Jewell taught me how to cook desserts and my dad taught me to make squirrel and dumplings. I still make that today, minus the squirrel.”
She continues to pass down her family tradition as over the years, she has taught many of her kids and grandkids, as well as a neighbor how to can. “I’ll teach anyone who wants to learn, right here in my own kitchen. My granddaughter wanted to learn to can so I taught her and her new husband. She even listed a canner as one of the items on her wedding registry and she got it. She also received a couple of cases of canning jars and she was thrilled.”
