canning peaches and pickle slices

back on august 2, i canned peaches and pickles with my mom.

while we were visiting my gramma in a small town in the middle of rural minnesota, we found faye elberta peaches in the little local grocery store.


my mom says faye elberta peaches are the absolute best for canning. but she hasnt been able to find them for years. so she bought two lugs (boxes) of 50 peaches each. they cost $16.99 a lug, which is HALF the cost of what we've been able to find at farmers markets or the grocery stores here in the cities.


clean sterilized jars


gorgeous ripe peaches


the stove setup. starting with the little tiny pan and moving clockwise, the water to heat and sterilize the lids, the canner, the pot of boiling water to blanch the peaches, and the pot of homemade syrup.


the counter setup. the towel is where i slice up the peaches and fill the jars. the yellow bowl is clean water for 'holding' the peaches that have been peeled and are awaiting slicing. they'll turn brown if exposed to air. the green bowl is right next to the pan of boiling water for blanching. the peaches go from boiling water to cool water and my mom rubs the peels off. that water gets dirty fast with all the peels, and has to be changed often.


we used ball "fruit fresh" to help prevent browning. it contains ascorbic acid (vitamin C) and citric acid. we only put it in the bowls of water, but apparently you're supposed to put it in the syrup as well.


blanch


peel (the peels just rub right off)


it takes me longer to slice and pit the peaches than it does to blanch and peel, so mom gets ahead of me now and then and stops to help slice. when my brother helps slice then the two of us can keep up.


i didnt get any pictures of the slicing and filling the jars because my hands are always wet and sticky thru that part of it. dont want to touch my camera.



this years our syrup was made of 24 cups of water and 4 cups of sugar.
we used around 87 of the 100 peaches in canning
processed the first canner full for 5 minutes (the water was already boiling)
processed the second and third batches for 7 minutes each.
one jar didnt seal.
12 quarts, 7 pints.


on to pickle slicers!!

first you must have cucumbers, all washed up


and plenty of garlic peeled


cut the heads off plenty of dill. we use a mandolin to get all the slices to be the same thickness. we like slightly thicker slices. skip the ends, they dont pickle well.


stuff the jars. we used two cloves of garlic in each pint, on the bottom with a large head of dill. stuff the slices in, and put a small head of dill on top. then pour in the brine.


we always seem to buy too many cucumbers. this is what was leftover after filling all our jars


for the compost bin, along with the peach peels and pits


our haul of goodies


our brine this time was 18 c water, 6 cups vinegar, 3/4 cup canning salt.
1 bushel of cucumbers (too many!)
we bought 3 bunches of dill
and used 5 bulbs of garlic
we processed 5 minutes in the canner.
we made 3 quarts and 18 pints.

and now they'll have to sit and pickle at least 3 months before we can even touch them.