Canning and Preserving For Dummies (11 page)

4. Cover the kettle and heat the water to a full, rolling boil, reducing the heat and maintaining a gentle, rolling boil for the amount of time indicated in the recipe.

Start your processing time after the water boils. Maintain a boil for the entire processing period.

If you live at an altitude above 1,000 feet above sea level, you need to adjust your processing time. Check out “Adjusting Your Processing Times at High Altitudes” later in this chapter for details.

Step 5: Removing your filled jars and testing the seals

After you complete the processing time, immediately remove your jars from the boiling water with a jar lifter and place them on clean, dry, kitchen or paper towels away from drafts, with 1 or 2 inches of space between the jars — don’t attempt to adjust the bands or check the seals — and allow them to cool completely. The cooling period may take 12 to 24 hours. Do not try to hurry this process by cooling the jars in any way. This may result in unsealed jars or cracked glass.

After your jars have completely cooled, test your seals by pushing on the center of the lid (see Figure 4-2). If the lid feels solid and doesn’t indent, you have a successful vacuum seal. If the lid depresses in the center and makes a popping noise when you apply pressure, the jar isn’t sealed. Immediately refrigerate unsealed jars, using the contents within two weeks or as stated in your recipe.

Step 6: Storing your canned food

After you’ve tested the seal and know that it’s good (see the preceding section), it’s time to store your canned food. To do that, follow these steps:

1. Remove the screw bands from your sealed jars.

2. Wash the sealed jars and the screw bands in hot, soapy water.

This removes any residue from the jars and screw bands.

3. Label your filled jars, including the date processed.

4. Store your jars, without the screw bands, in a cool, dark, dry place.

Adjusting Your Processing Times at High Altitudes

When you’re canning at an altitude higher than 1,000 feet above sea level, you need to adjust your processing time (see Table 4-1). Because the air is thinner at higher altitudes, water boils below 212 degrees. As a result, you need to process your food for a longer period of time to kill any microorganisms that can make your food unsafe.

If you live higher than 1,000 feet above sea level, follow these guidelines:

For processing times of less than 20 minutes:
Add 1 additional minute for each additional 1,000 feet of altitude.

For processing times of more than 20 minutes:
Add 2 additional minutes for each 1,000 feet of altitude.

If you don’t know your altitude level, you can get this information from many sources. Try contacting your public library, a local college, or the cooperative extension service in your county or state. Check your local phone book for contact numbers. Or check out
http://national4-hheadquarters.gov/Extension/index.html
. Just find your state on the map and then your location on the individual state’s site.

Chapter 5

Simply Fruit

In This Chapter

Preserving freshly picked fruit for optimum flavor

Preventing fruit from lightening and darkening

Choosing jar-filling liquids

Making easy fruit pies and side dishes

Canning fresh fruit is a great way to preserve large quantities of ripe fruit in a short period of time. Buying fruit when it is in season saves money, and you can be assured of the best-flavored fruit. Canning fruit is easy to do: Just fill your jars with fruit and hot liquid and then process them! With canned fruit readily available, you have an easy snack or a quick side dish.

This chapter explains the importance of using freshly picked, perfectly ripe fruit and keeping your fruit looking and tasting its best. In addition to the instructions for canning a variety of popular fruits, you’ll also find tomatoes in this chapter. Often considered a vegetable, they are actually a fruit, and can be canned using the same technique.

Picking and Preparing Your Fresh Fruit

When selecting your fruit, think fresh, fresh, fresh! The best fruit for canning is freshly picked, ripe fruit. You’re lucky if you grow your own fruit or have a friend who shares hers with you. Some growers offer a “pick your own” option in their growing area for a fee. (Ask growers at farmer’s markets or check your local phone directory for locations in your area.) You’ll need to bring your own containers for the fruit.

Fruit from your supermarket isn’t the best choice because it’s often picked before it’s fully ripened in order to compensate for the time it takes to get the fruit from the field to the store shelf. Don’t boycott your supermarket, just be finicky when selecting your fruit for canning.

The sooner you process your picked fruit, the better the texture and flavor of your final product. Your fruit can wait a few hours or overnight before you process it, but be sure to refrigerate it until you’re ready.

Almost all fresh fruits can well with these exceptions: bananas, lemons, limes, melons, persimmons, and strawberries.

Identifying the proper degree of ripeness

How do you know if your fruit is ripe?
Ripe
fruit is defined as being fully developed, or mature, and ready for eating. If you grow your own fruit, you can check its development and maturity daily.

To check the fruit’s ripeness

Hold the fruit in the palm of your hand and apply gentle pressure with your thumb and fingers.
The fruit should be firm to the touch. If there’s an impression in the fruit that doesn’t bounce back, the fruit is overripe. If it’s hard as a rock, it’s underripe. Neither should be canned. If you’re picking your fruit for canning, you can perform the same test, with a slight difference: Do it while the fruit’s still attached to the tree.

Smell the fruit.
Ripe fruit has a rich, full fruit aroma. A peach should smell like a peach; an apple should smell like an apple. The fragrance should be strong enough to entice you to devour the fruit on the spot.

Always use fruit picked directly from the bush or tree. Fruit collected from the ground (referred to as
dropped fruit
or
ground fruit
) is an indication that the fruit is overripe. Don’t use it for canning.

Cutting and peeling: Necessary or not?

When you can fruit, should you leave the skin on or take it off? Depends on the recipe. Sometimes leaving the skin on your fruit is optional. Other times, the peel must be removed. Always follow your recipe for specific guidelines.

Similarly, you may wonder whether cutting your fruit is necessary. The answer here depends on the fruit. The fruit you select dictates using it whole or cutting it into pieces. For example, fitting whole apples into a canning jar is difficult, but peeled apples cut into slices easily pack into a jar. You leave small fruit, like berries, whole.

Deterring discoloration

There’s probably nothing more unattractive than a piece of perfectly ripe cut fruit that’s
oxidized
o
r discolored,
dark or brown. Discoloration primarily occurs in apples, apricots, nectarines, peaches, and pears but may occur in other fruits.

You can protect your fruit from oxidation by slicing it directly into one of the following
antioxidant solutions,
a liquid to keep your fruit from darkening:

An ascorbic acid or citric solution:
Make a solution with 1 teaspoon of lemon or lime juice in 1 cup of cold water, or use a commercial product, like Ever-Fresh or Fruit-Fresh, available in most supermarkets. When using one of these products, follow the instructions on the container.

Ascorbic acid or citric acid is simply vitamin C. It doesn’t change the fruit flavor. It’s sold in powder form and is usually found in drugstores.

Vinegar, salt, and water:
Make this solution with 2 tablespoons of vinegar (5 percent acidity), 2 tablespoons of salt (pickling or kosher), and 1 gallon of cold water. Don’t leave your fruit in this solution longer than 20 minutes because the solution extracts nutrients from your fruit and changes its flavor.

After its dip in your antioxidant solution, you just rinse and drain your fruit before packing it into your prepared jars.

Raw pack and hot pack

Raw pack
and
hot pack
refer to two methods of getting the product into the jars. Generally, both methods can be used for either water-bath canning (covered in Chapter 4) or pressure canning (covered in Chapter 9). Whether you use one or the other is determined by the texture of the food and its tendency (or not) to not fall apart from a lot of cooking. Whether you raw-pack or hot-pack also affects the processing times of the foods. Always refer to your recipe for guidance.

Raw pack:
A raw pack is the preferred method for fruits that become delicate after cooking, such as peaches and nectarines. This method is what it says: packing raw fruit into hot jars.

Hot pack:
Hot packing heats your fruit in a hot liquid before packing it into your prepared jars. The advantages of hot packing over raw packing include fitting more fruit into the jars because the fruit’s softer and more pliable, using fewer jars because you can fit more fruit into the jars, and spending less time waiting for the water in your kettle to boil because the filled jars are hot in the middle.

With a few exceptions, most fresh fruits may be packed raw or hot. Always start with clean, ripe fruit and follow your recipe instructions.

Lining your jars with liquid

You always add liquid when canning fresh fruit. Your options are boiling water, sugar syrup, or fruit juice. Determining which liquid you use is up to you, but consider the final use for your canned fruit. For instance, if you’re using your canned berries in a fruit cobbler, boiling water may be the better choice because you’ll add sugar to the cobbler. If you’ll be eating your canned fruit out of the jar, use a sugar syrup or fruit juice.

After adding the hot liquid to your filled jars, you release any trapped air bubbles in the jar. If the headspace drops after releasing the air bubbles, add more liquid to maintain the proper headspace (refer to Chapter 3 for information about headspace). If the fruit level drops, you need to add fruit.

Sugar syrups

Sugar syrup is simply a mixture of sugar and water. It adds flavor to your canned fruit, preserves its color, and produces a smooth, firm texture. Other sweeteners, such as honey, may be added in addition to or without the sugar.

Use these guidelines for making your sugar-syrup choice:

Super-light syrup:
This syrup adds the least amount of calories. The sweetness level is the closest to the natural sugar level in most fruits.

Extra-light syrup:
Use this syrup for a sweet fruit, such as figs.

Light syrup:
This is best with sweet apples and berries.

Medium syrup:
This syrup complements tart apples, apricots, nectarines, peaches, and pears.

Heavy syrup:
Use this with sour fruit, such as grapefruit.

Table 5-1 offers you five concentrations of sugar syrup. Allow 1/2 to 3/4 cup of liquid for each filled pint jar and 1 1/2 cups of liquid for each filled quart jar of fruit. Bring your syrup ingredients to a boil in a saucepan over high heat; stir to dissolve the sugar.