What are you canning now?

[marymac]

Quote:
That's right, these are not processed pickles and they have to be refrigerated. I have a fridge in the garage that I keep such stuff in. In the winter my basement is real cold and I bring most of the stuff that's left in the garage into the basement. works out fine.

 

[ChickiKat]

bad year for me because of the heat and no rain, I have some peaches that I hope are not past prime, I hope to make preserves tomorrow....Otherwise, I dont know if I am going to get enough tomatoes to make ketchup and BBQ sauce, I put my tom plants out the last few days of April, then it froze on May 1, now with the heat I am not gonna get what I planned on... oh well, I hope we get good apples this year... I love apple butter!!

 

[DuckLady]

I canned 15 quarts of cherry pie filling.

I need to get more cherries to make jam.

 

[BarefootMom]

Quote:
jealous I LOVE Cherry pie but my kids and my Hubby do not

 

[weeders n feeders]

Just found this thread. Wow some wonderful recipes and beautiful pics. Alas I'm beginning to run out of room to store my canned goods myself and still have lots of tomatoes coming in. Anyone got ideas for where to put all these jars? I live in the south so the garage is outta the question cause it gets way too hot in there. I'm near the coast with water table too high to even think about a basement or root cellar. All my kitchen cabinets are open at the under the ceiling and are full of jars as is a closet in the spare bedroom. Ah but I do love "shopping" in that room in the winter.
Also to all of you sauce and paste makers I thought I'd share my method. I core and cut tomatoes in half or quarters depending on thier size and dump into a roasting pan. Add peppers and garlic and other vegis and spices depending on the recipe i'm making. And put it all in 300° oven. After about an hour I pull out the pan and dump it all into a colander and drain off any liquid. This gets canned too for soups and for cooking rice. Dump the solids back in the pan and repeat till thick. Once it's thick I let it cool a bit and then it all goes into my vita mix blender to be puréed. This blender is capable of rendering the peelings undetectable so I've saved that step plus get to keep the good fiber of the peelings. Doing them in the oven I don't have to watch them very close so I can be busy with other things and don't have to think of them much. And I get to keep all the juice instead of cooking it away so I get two things from one batch instead of just one.

Also anyone else use Tattler reusable lids for canning? They consist of a bpa free plastic lid and a rubber ring and can be used over and over. Cost a bit but since they are reusable that can be recovered in a few uses and then there's not more lids to buy.

 

[1AcreRooster]

Just put up 12 pints vidallia onion relish, and watermelon jelly

 

[BarefootMom]

Quote:
Places I have stored canned goods:
Under the bed in boxes that (make the boxes small enough that you can slide them out easily to see what you are getting)
Bottom of the closets
on the back porch (but it is insulated and I wrap the jars in newspapers)
In the winter I will put them in the stairway to the attic BUT I must remove them before it gets too hot.

I haven't used the Tattler reusable lids but would like to sometime. I didn't discover them until after I had bought my lids for the season. I buy my lids in bulk from the Amish-end up paying about $1.19 a dozen.

I haven't ever heard of anyone doing the tomatoes your way- but doesn't the kitchen get unbearably hot with the oven on? My burners were on from 8am til 6:45pm yesterday and it was HOT in there-couldn't imagine having the oven on too. I am able to get 2 products out of one too. My process is:

*Blanch tomatoes in HWB
*Fill both sinks with ICE Water and add tomatoes when skin begins to crack
*Peel tomatoes and put whole peeled tomatoes in LARGE dishpan, Core tomatoes and slice putting them back in the dishpan.
*The dish pan will fill with juice when you put the sliced tomatoes back in.
* Squish up with hands or chop (depends how patient you are and particular) or Puree the tomatoes add to pan- make whatever sauce you are wanting to do.
*Process sauce, when you have enough juice put it in a pot and add whatever you want (I usually add some hot pepper seeds because I use my juice for chili) to season or don't add anything at all. Heat through, process.
*Start over...
I process all Tomato products in HWB for 40 minutes Quarts and 35 minutes pints.

 

[weeders n feeders]

Barefoot, i've found that with the oven at a low (250-300) the kitchen heats up less than it does with a big pot on the stove top that is putting out all that steam. It more the humidity that makes it feel so hot than the heat and with my way I don't generate as much humidity because I pour the juice off before it turns to steam. And since I don't peel them I don't scald which also saves some humidity production and heat. When I do stewed tomatoes I pretty much follow your method except after I peel them I'll put the peelings in the Vita mix and puree them and add that to the pot too. I usually pressure cook all mine ten minutes at ten pounds. It's faster and again doesn't heat things up as much.

Under the bed would be good storage except two of our beds are murfey beds that fold up into the wall ,another is a waterbed with drawers underneath and the last also has drawers underneath instead of dressers. We're pretty tight on space. Thanks to three avid readers who never want to give up their books we've even built bookcases in-between the studs in the interior walls.

 

[vfem]

FIG TIME!!!

 

[3goodeggs]

I don't know if I should be happy for you or give you my sympathies.
Canning is fun, but it is also a lot of hard work.

I have been watching all of these tubs and pots full of sauces and tomatoes and I am glad that I have sworn off anymore canning this summer. I am plumb out of room.

although... I have all of these watermelon that are going to go bad when we head out of town.
If I want to make jelly, can I freeze the hearts and use them later?