Tomatoes fresh off the vine, six kinds of plums, huge bunches of fresh basil and rosemary, piles of locally grown eggplant and squash - such bounty.

Even when I eat my fill of peaches in August, I am still grateful to open a jar of home-made peach preserves in December, when it seems that eating fresh and local has been limited to pumpkin, parsnips, and potatoes.

More and more home cooks are transforming produce at its peak into sauces, preserves, and pickled marinated condiments to enjoy as our local fresh harvest dwindles. Workshops on home canning and pickling at diverse venues around the city this summer, such as Historic Wyck House in Germantown and Greensgrow Farms in Kensington, have been fully subscribed.

People of all ages are discovering that making your own jams or pickles in small batches gives you ultimate control over the quality and the cost. You can make jam with less sugar, pickles with less salt, roasted peppers from your garden or local farm, with no additives besides your favorite herbs and garlic.

Once the province of the farm family, canning and preserving are now promoted and practiced by top chefs, garden and cooking bloggers, and home cooks who share an interest in eating locally produced foods that taste great.

Ball, one of the leading manufacturers of home canning supplies, reports that its sales are up more than 30 percent since 2007. And, according to a recent poll of subscribers to allrecipes.com, almost half of today's home canners are 40 and under.

"Putting up" conjures images of piles of fruit, steaming kettles, and lots of jars - which is indeed one very satisfying and really quite easy way to preserve the harvest bounty. (See accompanying story.)

But there are also other easy ways to preserve small (or large) batches of many of the delights piling up on roadside and urban farm stands, backyard gardens, and orchards. Besides canning, the classic methods include pickling (a subset of canning), oven drying or dehydrating, and freezing.

Wondering how to get started? Be alert for a good deal on fresh fruit and vegetables. Local peaches piled high in wood boxes at my local food co-op got me going this year. Last week I made several batches of peach jam, brandied peaches, peach-infused vodka to serve at my December holiday party, and herbed peaches in light syrup.

Despite the tomato blight, I had so many cherry and plum tomatoes in our backyard plot that I oven-dried and packed 10 pints (almost 20 pounds of raw tomatoes) with basil and garlic olive oil to eat all fall.

A few tender yellow summer squash inspired a surprisingly delicious marinated pickled squash with mint and olive oil.

Then there were the beautiful local raspberries and red plums at the farmers market this week. Once home, as I saw the red fruit piled on the counter, I remembered some local organic cranberries I had tucked in the freezer last winter. The three red fruits combined with some sugar made an extraordinarily easy, gorgeous jewel-toned preserve that tasted tart, sweet, and delicious.

Jam, or fruit preserves, is basically chopped-up fruit cooked with sugar until thick. It's that simple. There are tricks and tips for specific fruits, but it's hard to go wrong if you start with blemish-free ripe fruit. Sometimes a squeeze of lemon juice aids with acidity.

With juicy fruit, such as peaches, I like to cut up the fruit (peeling first if the skin is thick), and toss the chopped peaches with some sugar in a colander set over a bowl to collect the juices. I cook this juice until syrupy before adding the chopped fruit. This allows a shorter cooking time to reach thickness, and more fresh flavor is retained. In my red-fruit jam I slow-cook a thick plum-cranberry-sugar mixture, then add the raspberries at the end.

Every batch of fruit varies in ripeness, sweetness, and water content, so it is important to taste each batch. It's fine to add a bit more sugar or a few teaspoons of lemon at the very end of cooking jam or preserves. Jellies are trickier in their proportions, and less forgiving, so I stick with jams, preserves, and conserves.

If you want to avoid the whole boiling and sealing process of canning, simply store your finished product in the refrigerator and eat it within about a month or freeze for four to six months.

Many of my friends freeze lightly blanched veggies to use through the winter. I freeze various herb pestos and herb/olive oil purees in ice cube trays. Once they're frozen, I pop these flavor-filled cubes into well-labeled storage containers for easy one-portion use through winter. I've been doing this so long my family thinks of pesto as a winter staple.

I also make several batches of summer vegetable soups for the freezer, but find most frozen vegetables unappealing. The exceptions are tomatoes and peppers. Frozen whole or halved, peeled or not, frozen tomatoes can be used for many winter meals. Peppers should be seeded and destemmed, and can be frozen raw or after being charred on the grill, peeled or not. Both of these vegetables enliven soups, stews, and sauces with a burst of summer right from the freezer.

Oven-drying magically transforms tomatoes and sweet juicy fruits into an even sweeter, more flavorful and storable form. Even if you are going to eat them today, oven-drying is worth a try.

Cut stone fruit (peaches, apricots, plums), figs, or cherry or plum tomatoes in half, and lay them cut side up on a cookie sheet lined with parchment (or a silicone pan liner). Sprinkle lightly with sugar (for fruits) - Maldon or other sea salt for tomatoes - and place in an oven set on its lowest setting. (My oven goes as low as 170 degrees, up to about 200 degrees works fine.) After six to 12 hours when the fruit is dried but still soft, remove and cool. Store for up to two weeks in the fridge, three to four months in the freezer, stacked in a well-sealed container between layers of parchment or waxed paper.