Food preservation is a great way to preserve harvest from personal gardens/farmer’s markets to be able to enjoy safe food year round as well as save money and have more control of what goes in your food. A survey of Clark County Extension Council as well as Clark County Homemakers was distributed at the beginning of the 2019 calendar year. The survey asked about desired extension programming and there was interest in food preservation programming. Learning the most current, research-based techniques for food preservation is imperative when attempting to preserve food in your home. By learning how to preserve food properly, residents will protect and maintain the health of their families.

As a result of the expressed desire to learn, a food preservation program was implemented in August of 2019. The Clark County Family and Consumer Sciences agent partnered with the NEP program and retired FCS Agents experienced in food preservation to offer a Three Day Food Preservation program. The program was designed to teach participants about all aspects of food preservation, focusing on safe home food preservation techniques, equipment and tools. The program was advertised on social media and newspaper articles, the farmer’s market, extension newsletters, and word-of-mouth. There were fourteen participants signed up and eight of those participants completed all of the sessions. They were taught the pressure canning, water bath canning, freezing and drying methods of food preservation.  Almost half (44%) of the participants were new to Cooperative Extension programming.   Over one-third (38%) of the participants reported using food preservation methods never or rarely prior to the program, and another 38% reported using food preservation methods sometimes.  

After the program, the participants indicated some increase in food preservation skills even with the previous experience reported by participants.  Before and after the program, participants self-report their skill level for each method as either ‘beginner’, ‘intermediate’ or ‘experienced’.   Approximately half of the participants reported an increase in skill levels in the pressure canning method following the class.  All participants (100%) agreed or strongly agreed they had better skills in home food preservation methods, could identify research-based methods of home food preservation, could identify the necessary equipment for home food preservation methods, could accurately prepare foods and containers for home food preservation, understood the difference in and could identify the correct method for canning low acid and high acid foods and could identify spoilage in home preserved products after the program. Half of the participants (50%) reported growing a garden this year, and are planting in over a total of 130 square feet of garden area.   Participants commented that the class was “awesome” and appreciated being able to take home the foods they preserved.  

Seven months following the 2019 Clark County Food Preservation Program, three participants completed a Food Preservation Follow-Up Survey to determine if and how they had used the skills they acquired in the class.  All (100%) reported using the foods they had prepared during the program and also reported that they had used their food preservation skills to preserve food at home from their own garden, others’ gardens, the grocery store and the farmer’s market.  Using their food preservation skills, participants reported freezing 3 gallons of fruit, freezing and canning 62 quarts and 20 pints of vegetables, canning 26 pints of jam, and canning 101 pints of pickles this year. All participants (100%) reported sharing what they had learned with others. All participants still strongly agreed that they had retained all the skills they had learned from the program. Comments indicated appreciation for the information received in the class and there were no suggestions for program improvement.