Plums (from the Ball Blue Book)

Yesterday at the Easton Farmers Market, we bought a little more than three pounds of funky plums. We plan on 'putting them up' today. The right way. So, I got out the Ball Blue Book and began to study.

PLUMS
- 1.5 to 2.5 pounds plums per quart
- Sugar
- water

Hot pack: (I think I have to master hot pack before I can 'get' cold pack. My cold pack efforts have lead to fruit float.)
Wash plums. Drain. Prick whole plums in several places. Make a medium or heavy syrup. Boil. Reduce heat and simmer five minutes.
Cook plums one layer at a time, remove from pot and keep hot. After all plums are cooked, remove plums to syrup and let stand 30 minutes.
Remove plums. Simmer syrup. Pack plums into jars, ladle syrup, 1/2 inch headspace, cap, process 30 minutes in boiling water canner. 20 minutes per pints.

Plums may be cutvin half but are usually canned unpeeled.

Honey Spiced Peaches

My mother-in-law brought some peaches yesterday. I decided to make Ball's honey spiced peaches and as usual I didn't read the directions correctly and made a mess out of the whole situation.

But I do have 2 pints of peaches.

And a quart that will become some sort of peach dessert or muffins today.

My mother-in-law said that instead of heating and peeling peaches, they thick peeled their peaches and used the fleshy peels for pie. I tried that.

Honey Spiced Peaches
Yields about 3 quarts

8 pounds small peaches
Fruit fresh
1 cup sugar
4 cups water
2 cups honey
3 sticks cinnamon (one for each jar)
1 1/2 teaspoons all spice
3/4 teaspoon whole cloves

Wash, drain & peel peaches. Leave peaches whole. Treat with fruit fresh. (I didn't leave mine whole. Didn't notice that until now. I also used lemon juice instead of fruit fresh.)

Combine sugar, water and honey in large saucepan. Cook until sugar dissolves.

Drain peaches. Cook peaches one layer at a time in syrup about 3 minutes each (missed this too).

Pack hot peaches into jars leaving 1/2 inch headspace. Add one stick, 1/2 teaspoon all spice and 1/4 teaspoon cloves to each jar. Ladlehot syrup in, leaving proper headspace.

Cap and process 25 minutes in boiling water canner.

Dilly Beans

Haven't tried this one yet, I made my own version.

The first one is from the Ball Blue Book, 1974

DILLY BEANS

2 pounds green beans, trimmed
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
4 cloves garlic
4 heads dill
2.5 cups water
2.5 cups vinegar
1/4 c salt

Pack beans into hot jars leaving 1/4 inch head space. To each pint add 1/4 tsp. cayenne pepper, 1 clove garlic and 1 head dill. (Mom put this on the bottom!) Combine remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. Pour, boiling hot over beans, leaving 1/4 inch head space. Adjust caps. Process pints and quarts 10 minutes in boiling water bath.

Yields 4 pints

Note: let beans stand for two weeks before tasting to allow the flavor to develop.


Gayle is sure that this is the recipe her mom used (the page is awful stained in the book). Her sister disagrees and thinks it's this one from the Better Homes and Garden Home Canning Cookbook. (1973) The ingredients are similar. Again, a stained page.

2 pounds green beans, trimmed
1 cup white vinegar
2 tablespoons pickling salt
2 teaspoons dillweed
1/4 teaspon cayenne
2 cloves garlic, crushed.

Yields 4 pints. Process in boiling water bath for 10 minutes.

Canning peaches

My mother-in-law is now talking about picking peaches and bringing us some fruit to preserve. Gayle did some research and some family chatting and compiled her notes on peaches. But, the odd thing is, both my mother-in-law's family, my mother-in-law's mother-in-law's family and Gayle's family always included a peach pit in every quart. Why? Did it change the flavor or the acidity?  Or was it mere food superstition?

FROM GAYLE:

I don't remember peaches being this much work1 I guess it's because there was many people. Sharon said she had to dip and skin them.

Peaches
From my Ball Book c 1974

It starts with the whole check, wash and heat the jars routine.

Sort wash & drain enough firm ripe peaches for one canner load. Fill water bath canner half full with hot water. Put canner on to heat. Prepare sugar syrup. (i'm sure mom made the light.)

Place peaches in wire baket or cheesecloth. Dip peaches into boiling water 1/2 to 1 minute to loosen skins. Dip into cold water. Drain.

Cut peaches in half, pit and peel. (You can slice, that's what mom did.) Scrape cavities to remove pink and red fibers because they might turn ugly brown in processing. Pack peaches into hot jars, cavity side down, layers overlapping. Leave 1/2 inch head space

Cover peaches with boiling hot syrup leaving 1.2 in headspace. It will take 1-1.5 cups syrup for each quart jar.

Run table knife gently between fruit and jar to release air bubbles. Add more syrup if needed

Wipe top and threads. Put on lid and band...tighly

Place in canner with hot water (not boiling). Water should cover 1 to 2 inches.

Process pints 25 minutes or Quarts 30 minutes after boiling

Let cool 12 hours before removing bands, checking for seal, and storing.

SYRUP
Light syrup
2 cups of sugar to 1 qt of water, yield is 5 cups.

Medium syrup
3 cups of sugar to 1 qt of water, yield is 5 cups.

Heavy syrup
4.25 cups of sugar to 1 qt of water, yield is 5 cups.

Measure sugar and liquid (either water or fruit juice) into saucepan. Cook until sugar dissolves. Keep syrup hot until needed, but do not let it boil down. Usually 1-1.5 cups of syrup are needed for each quart of fruit.