I have a massive collection of jars. And an even massiver collection of lids. I love jars. I buy certain certain products for the shape of the jar. I buy Roundy’s pickle slices, for instance, for the lack of decorative patterns, simple shape, wide mouth and the easy way the label comes off. I reuse jars for all sorts of things. Obviously for storage but I also can stuff; pickles, tomato sauce, that unfortunate corn relish, green tomatoes that I have yet to eat because of their suspicious color. I also use them for turpentine and oil painting medium which renders them useless for other things.
My favorite jars have softly rounded squared off sides. Marinated artichoke hearts come in them. Getting the labels off is not easy. I usually have to resort to some sort of toxic de-gummifier which I hate but the jars are worth it. I have jars that are so old that the shape of them have changed 2 or 3 times. Barilla tomato sauce comes to mind. I have scores of them in their various evolved shapes and design. I like ones that look like real canning jars. Classico sauce comes in Atlas jars. Too bad I don’t like Classico as much as Barilla. But both make good jars for canning (even more tomato sauce).
But my real problem are lids. How do I have so many lids, way more lids than jars and how is it that they do not fit on the jars I have?? Why do they make jars with so many different sizes? Can’t they all get together and come up with just a little more standardization? I have lids that just barely don’t fit. Why do we have to have that?? Would it be so hard to standardize things?
This is a Saturday morning in the late fall kind of job. Match the lids to jars and then dump whatever is left over in recycling or garbage. My life will feel more complete.
