Canning Pear Juice

 

I started off by cooking sliced pears in a little bit of water (a full pot of sliced pears with about 1-2 inches of water at the bottom). I cooked them with a lid on (stirring occasionally) until they were slightly mushy. At that point I set up my kitchen aid mixer with the juicer attachment and put all the fruit through there. This went alot faster than I thought! Addie loved watching all the juice and pulp fall into the gallon jar.

Then I used a fine strainer and strained out the juice from the pulp (so I could add the pulp to the Apple Pear Sauce!). I started with 2 gallons of Pear pulp and juice and ended up with 1 gallon of each after the juice was strained from the pulp.

I prepared my stove top with my water bath canner while also getting the lids sterilized in hot water. With my jars all sterilized I put them in the oven to keep hot and sterile.

The juice is placed in a large pot over medium high heat (stirring regularly) until boiling. Lemon Juice and Sugar is not completely necessary, but I added a couple squirts of lemon juice and about a cup of sugar to the pot to help with preservation and color.

Pour the boiling juice into sterilized jars and water bath for 20 minutes.

Let the jars set overnight to cool and seal and they are ready to clean, label and store!

Apples and Pears!

My cousin brought over 35+ lbs of Apples and 45+ lbs of Pears that had fallen from their fruit trees and were in immediate need of canning. We worked all day and after she left I even worked into the night to get all this done and ready for storage! It was alot of work, but extremely fun!! I didn't get very many good step by step pictures because we were more focused on trying to figure out what we were doing and keeping the kids from taking a bite out of each and every apple and pear :)

When we first started we had extremely different plans for the apples and pears, but as the coarse of the day unfolded, so did our plans! We had plans to make mostly pear slices out of the pears, but they were very ripe and extremely hard to peal...as well as we were running out of time. So we made as many jars of pear slices as we could and then used the rest to add to the apple sauce and make apple pear sauce (DELIGHTFUL!). Also some pear juice that is "extremely delicious", at least that was Henry's assessment :)

Apple Pear Sauce - 9 Quarts

Pear Juice - 5 Quarts

Apple Slices - 8 Quarts

Pear Slices - 6 Pints, 1 Half Pints

Apple Butter - 1 Quart, 2 Pints, 2 Half Pints

Canning Herb Syrup - Mint, Spearmint, Chocolate Mint, Lavendar, Basil

I have several varieties of mint growing like crazy in the garden so I decided it would be fun to make up some mint simple syrup to can for winter! I love to add mint simple syrup to my tea as well as with some club soda and ice for a "soda like" beverage. I'm also excited to try some lemonade sweetened with mint syrup :) I think I am going to do this syrup idea with some basil and lavender as well!!

 Start by removing and cleaning all your mint leaves. Then place them in water (proportions per batch are found at the end of this post). Bring them to a boil then reduce heat to low and simmer for about 30 minutes...or longer if you get distracted! Stirring occasionally to help keep the leaves working and oils extracting! (during this time make sure your jars are getting sterilized and placed in a warm oven as well as getting your water bath canner boiling and ready for the full jars of syrup)

Once the leaves have simmered you will want to strain out all the leaves to only have the delicious juice. I like to use a small hand strainer over a 1 gallon glass jar. Then pour the juice back into the pot. You can see how dark and rich the liquid is from the essential oils in the leaves! Press out as much liquid as you can from the leaves...the last few drops are the best!!

Add the desired lemon or lime juice and then bring the liquid to a boil and add the sugar, stirring constantly once the sugar is added. You only need to heat the syrup until the sugar is dissolved, which could be as little as a minute, but may take a few minutes.

 With your hot sterilized jars ready to go as well as your lids and water bath canner, you are ready to fill your jars.

Fill your jars to within 1/4 inch from the top...be careful not to make a big mess...this is syrup remember and is very sticky!

Clean off the rims and place on your sterilized lids and rings and process in a boiling water bath canner for 10 minutes.

I did several batches and made 11 quarts of mint syrup (7 chocolate mint, 3 spearmint, and 1 that is a combo).

These are the quantities I used (per batch): This batch will make about 3 quarts of syrup

• 
  
  6 cups Herb leaves (loosely packed) You can use any herb you have: Any Mint, Lavender, Basil, etc.
• 
  
  10 cups Water
• 
  
  This made about 8 cups of liquids after simmering and so I added 8 cups of sugar
• 
  
  1/3 cup lemon juice

Addie loves these Goats

Does it get any cuter than a little girl with her two precious goats :)