I am getting very close to running out of jars. That’s going to put a stop to my canning til I empty some jars or until my next Azure order arrives, which is the end of September. I may empty 15 or so jars per week but that’s a combination of half pints, pints and quarts so it takes a while to accumulate enough to have the pints or quarts I need to do some canning.
Yesterday we left the house before 8 and drove about an hour to get a bushel of peaches. I’ve probably had worse peaches but I can’t remember when! 🙁 There were probably 15 or 20 of them that got tossed. There was enough peach flavor (but not much) to make a decent pie filling. I stirred up a batch of jam and had Vince taste it and he said it was good so I made a second batch.
I ended up with 15 pints of pie filling and 17 half pints of jam.
I diced up some of the peaches and have four trays in the freeze dryer now and four trays waiting in the freezer for their turn in the freeze dryer. I started the freeze dryer about 3 p.m. yesterday and I’m guessing the peaches will be done some time Wednesday evening, hopefully. I’ll let the freeze dryer defrost on its own (vs. automatic defrost which uses a good bit of electricity) so I’m hoping to get the second batch going by Thursday morning but the peaches may take longer and I may not get the second batch started til Friday.
I think Vince is planning to go get apples Thursday or Friday. We’ll be getting them from an almost local orchard in Kansas and I’m hoping they’re way better than the peaches were. The peaches were from a fruit stand that ordered them from somewhere up north – Michigan or Minnesota .. can’t remember.
I have ground beef out that has to be canned today. I’m going to can it in 1-1/2 pint jars because I only have a few pint jars left and I want some of those for the apples. Pie filling in a pint jars is just perfect for us!
Joyce says
End of season peaches just aren’t very good. I bought peaches Friday that seemed very firm, so I left them out for a couple of days. Yesterday (Monday) over half of them were moldy. Ugh!
judy.blog@gmail.com says
Once they start getting ripe, they go quickly. It was so much nicer when we grew our own and we picked them over several weeks and didn’t have to process them all at once.
Sandi B says
I’ve got all kinds of jars. I haven’t canned this year. Let me know if you want me to bring them up. (I have all sizes.)
judy.blog@gmail.com says
No. I want you to can and fill them up for yourself! Seriously, I really don’t need any more. As long as I have jars, I’ll keep filling them and I need to stop.
Donna in KS says
Oh, so sad to get not wonderful peaches! I bought two boxes (lugs) from Youth for Christ. They came from Colorado, are quite good. I have frozen some, share with family and friends and eat for breakfast and snack!! Really sorry you have not been as fortunate.
nalaxu says
There are peach and apple orchards all around where I live. I finally found an advantage to living here over your place! I have an apple tree that we neglected for 20 years and now that we are retired we decided to try to get some apples from it. I said with the cost of chemicals for disease and insects we would be better off just going to the orchard and buying apples. My husband wants to give it one more try. The birds and bugs won the first battle!
KATIE M PETERSON says
Do the zip loc plastic bag trick, when the apples are marble size take a bag with tiny nips out of the bottom corners to let the rain out. Then zip the apple inside the bag around the stem. as for the crawling bugs take dble sided sticky tape and wrap your trunk with it, they get stuck. Check the bags every now and then to make sure the rain is getting out. When the harvest is done remove the sticky tape.
nalaxu says
I’ll try to remember to do this for next year. I didn’t realize that you should remove apples so there aren’t very close together either. It is a constant learning experience!
LisaS says
Do you mind sharing the cost of the peaches? My sister bought a bushel to can and was charged $98!
judy.blog@gmail.com says
I paid $60/bushel