Apple canning day!

Jim Burr

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Thanks to Brents massive knowledge and willingness to share, Stacey went on a buying spree last few days...guess I rolled the ball. Have to wait a week for the pressure cooking doo dad.

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well jim, it kinda amusing to me to see folks like you just getting into the canning of food world,, i have been around it since childhood:) does make for some fine eating in the winter time when the stuff is long gone.
 
Have to wait a week for the pressure cooking doo dad.

:huh: Apples are high acidity foods and should be fine to boiling water bath which is what it looks like you're doing here :huh:

BTW: I hope you didn't throw out the cores and peals!! ?!?! :eek: Those make fantastic apple butter (just run them through a chinois part way through cooking to press the flesh off of the actual peal /seeds).

My favorite canned apples that I haven't had in a long time (20+ years?) was the larger (say 1 to 1.5" diameter) crabs we'd can whole in simple syrup with some cloves stuck in them. You could pick one by the stem and just stick the whole thing in your mouth and pull out the core. Man those were tasty!
 
:huh: Apples are high acidity foods and should be fine to boiling water bath which is what it looks like you're doing here :huh:

BTW: I hope you didn't throw out the cores and peals!! ?!?! :eek: Those make fantastic apple butter (just run them through a chinois part way through cooking to press the flesh off of the actual peal /seeds).

My favorite canned apples that I haven't had in a long time (20+ years?) was the larger (say 1 to 1.5" diameter) crabs we'd can whole in simple syrup with some cloves stuck in them. You could pick one by the stem and just stick the whole thing in your mouth and pull out the core. Man those were tasty!

you got a recipe for those crab apples ryan?? sounds kinda like spiced apples in the store:)
 
Lou, my mom and Tess just finished up about 60 quarts of applesauce. We have one of the food mills that you put the appleslices into and it spits the apple out one direction and the peels and seeds out another. Goats and pigs love canning time! We didn't get any beans canned this year but we always hot bath our beans, apple sauce as well as tomato juice and soup. Nothing like it on a cold day eating fresh from the garden.
 
well jim, it kinda amusing to me to see folks like you just getting into the canning of food world,, i have been around it since childhood:) does make for some fine eating in the winter time when the stuff is long gone.

Larry...I was born into this, but if Mrs. Burr does the "Really?" thing...no chance. Before mom hit the loony bin, I learned all that stuff...had a bunch of supplies in the garage that we pulled out to use. Been a while for me, so Brent(Thanks!!) gave me tons of "heads up" chat. A lot of it really did come back...mom canned everything, I mean everything!!! Pickles were the top of the list...3 berry jam right there with it.
I guess I put the bug in Stacy's ear a few weeks ago...little testy when I said "oh...do it this way". We had a ball and now wifey has the bug!!! Can't wait for summer to show up...fruit, tomatoes...anything and right off the vine. She has the addiction and now are searching yard sales for Mason jars.
 
you got a recipe for those crab apples ryan?? sounds kinda like spiced apples in the store:)

Been a long time so I don't really remember the details (mostly just the eating :D). i'll give you what I remember though. As I recall them we just used a simple syrup (50/50 sugar/water by volume heated until it dissolved) and then stuck 2-4 cloves into the skin of each apple, packed them into jars and boiling water bath canned them covered in the syrup. I think we poked the apples with a fork to let the syrup in (not positive but seems right). I don't remember the cooking time duration - I think maybe 30 to 45 minutes but its been so long I don't know. I see some people pre-cooking crabs like this - I don't remember if we did or not. I see some folks remove the blossom end, I know we didn't but don't know why or why not. I don't remember there being other spices in the jar but can't see how it would hurt if you wanted to add them :D Maybe a little cinnamon stick and whole allspice?
 
:huh: Apples are high acidity foods and should be fine to boiling water bath which is what it looks like you're doing here :huh:

I've never done apples, but I do make a decent jalapeno jelly!

I gave jim the whole spiel on the hi/low acid water bath/pressure canning. He's a safety kind of guy, so pretty sure he'll follow the recipes and methods to the letter.

What I like to can is soups/stews/chili. Love to just open a jar from the pantry, heat and eat. (And that does require a pressure canner).

Maybe next year I'll hit up an orchard and do some fruits....
 
:huh: Apples are high acidity foods and should be fine to boiling water bath which is what it looks like you're doing here :huh:

BTW: I hope you didn't throw out the cores and peals!! ?!?! :eek: Those make fantastic apple butter (just run them through a chinois part way through cooking to press the flesh off of the actual peal /seeds).

My favorite canned apples that I haven't had in a long time (20+ years?) was the larger (say 1 to 1.5" diameter) crabs we'd can whole in simple syrup with some cloves stuck in them. You could pick one by the stem and just stick the whole thing in your mouth and pull out the core. Man those were tasty!

Got all that covered Ryan. Yosemite Village has one of the oldest crab apple groves in California, we are in the backyard and if you know who to talk to...we are on that one. We never toss out much...compost bin on steroids!
 
Been a long time so I don't really remember the details (mostly just the eating :D). i'll give you what I remember though. As I recall them we just used a simple syrup (50/50 sugar/water by volume heated until it dissolved) and then stuck 2-4 cloves into the skin of each apple, packed them into jars and boiling water bath canned them covered in the syrup. I think we poked the apples with a fork to let the syrup in (not positive but seems right). I don't remember the cooking time duration - I think maybe 30 to 45 minutes but its been so long I don't know. I see some people pre-cooking crabs like this - I don't remember if we did or not. I see some folks remove the blossom end, I know we didn't but don't know why or why not. I don't remember there being other spices in the jar but can't see how it would hurt if you wanted to add them :D Maybe a little cinnamon stick and whole allspice?

We did a thinner slice...1/2", cloves and cinnamon in the simple sugar...1 quart water...1.5 cups sugar. We use honey because it's so abundant. Can as normal. I really want to toss a knuckle of ginger in there. What about a whole nutmeg Ryan...pint jar?
 
We did a thinner slice...1/2", cloves and cinnamon in the simple sugar...1 quart water...1.5 cups sugar. We use honey because it's so abundant. Can as normal. I really want to toss a knuckle of ginger in there. What about a whole nutmeg Ryan...pint jar?

A whole nutmeg per jar sounds like to much imho. I might crack one into chunks and put in a couple of small pieces per? Not sure.. nutmeg can get away from you; I might try a handful of jars with and without and see what you like. And don't judge to quickly, what seems nice today might be pretty bleh around February 9and vice versa). One thing I've learned about spices from brewing with them is that a gentle hand goes a long ways with some of them and they keep on giving for a long time.

One other thing I might consider trying if you have a lot and are feeling experimental is some black pepper (say maybe 6 corns per quart). I would give those a few (?up to six? try one every month or so) months to smooth out but I've found it can add a really interesting undertone to some things like this if you give it enough time; the sharp bite eventually goes away and you're left with this interesting depth from it.

Ginger sounds good to me :D The only real downside to to much ginger is that it can get soapy tasting in some uses (haven't really figured out exactly all where/why), but it seems that candying it (or cooking in syrup I'd think would do the same probably?) seems to mitigate that. Other than that I personally don't think you can have to much ginger!

I remember doing them in quarts. Seemed like it was never a problem with that being to much :rolleyes: :D Either should work though, although I think you're probably loosing a lot of volume to the jar with pints in this case (I think you can probably more efficiently pack into quarts than pints - at least my knee jerk reaction is telling me you could, might be all wet there).

I remember when we did jams with 100% honey and wax seals (please don't use wax seals, this was in the late 70's and we didn't know better :D) the honey jams had more mold problems than the sugar based jams. Not really sure why as the sugar content should have been similar.. I suspect that it was somehow sticking to the jar more or something and impeding the seal between the wax and the jar. No problems with modern canning jars though. I'd agree the taste should be better!
 
Ginger sounds good to me :D The only real downside to to much ginger is that it can get soapy tasting in some uses (haven't really figured out exactly all where/why), but it seems that candying it (or cooking in syrup I'd think would do the same probably?) seems to mitigate that. Other than that I personally don't think you can have to much ginger!
I remember when we did jams with 100% honey and wax seals (please don't use wax seals, this was in the late 70's and we didn't know better :D) the honey jams had more mold problems than the sugar based jams. Not really sure why as the sugar content should have been similar.. I suspect that it was somehow sticking to the jar more or something and impeding the seal between the wax and the jar. No problems with modern canning jars though. I'd agree the taste should be better!

Saw that coming Ryan...2-3 grates of fresh ginger...little bite, nothing offensive.
It's so cool to find some one that remembers wax seals!! 1/8 to 1/4" thick and then the lid...that goes way way back!!
I'm settling back and letting Stacey learn this stuff. Most...not all!!! of us that are 40+ grew up in homes that canned. Like turning...it's a lost art, but secretly on the rise. Unlike times past...we are trying some different stuff, if it bombs, crack the lid and do it again! Just cuz...thanks Brent!!
 
My sister is the canner in our family. I used to help Mom with it, but don't remember a whole lot. Will have to catch sis next year when the garden is in season and get some lessons to refresh my memory.
 
Saw that coming Ryan...2-3 grates of fresh ginger...little bite, nothing offensive.

heh, hard to get to gingery :D

It's so cool to find some one that remembers wax seals!! 1/8 to 1/4" thick and then the lid...that goes way way back!!

Apparently some people still use it :eek: We even re-used the wax which is even sketchier (basically rendered it over water).

For quite a number of years we also used the glass top rubber gasket with wire bale jars as well. There were a lot of failures with those to.

I'm settling back and letting Stacey learn this stuff. Most...not all!!! of us that are 40+ grew up in homes that canned. Like turning...it's a lost art, but secretly on the rise. Unlike times past...we are trying some different stuff, if it bombs, crack the lid and do it again! Just cuz...thanks Brent!!

One big change I see now is that the information is so much more available (and there is so much more of it) that you can start to apply something vaguely resembling science to your processes. Back then we had a lot of "this works so don't mess with it" now we have a lot more of "we know why this works and therefore we can apply that to also making this work".

We had a similar situation here where I've converted LOML into a canning wizard. She now knows WAY more about it than I do, but started out never having done it at all. There are still occasional "and also this" moments but they're getting pretty rare.
 
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