Canning Etc. Season 2018

Been a busy canning week in the Dood household. I’m waiting on 6qt of Honey Select corn to finish depressurizing, and that’s after doing another 7qt earlier today.

We picked about 70 ears about noon, as the silks were getting almost black and dry. We left probably another 50 or so smaller ears on the stalks as they aren’t quite ready yet. I did a lot of “quality assurance” while we were loading up the jars. It’s like eating candy, but still has a good corn flavor.

Very impressive ears, the largest I think was over 9in, about 3in thick, with fat, juicy kernels. Average size was about 8in. This variety will prob get a place in next year’s garden.

The Silver Queen will probably be ready next week, and the popcorn will stay on until it’s dry and hard enough for its purpose. We’re growing Strawberry and Japanese Hulless for that.

Yesterday I picked a bunch of yellow banana peppers, and we ended up canning about 9 pints cut into rings.

We also have quite a few pole beans that need to be picked and canned, and lots of other peppers as well.

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Apples drying in 8’x2’x2’ homemade dry kiln. Actually used the self-timer feature of the camera to take this shot with the lid of the kiln down. Four vent holes at the top in the lid can be seen. Fan blowing with 4 100 watt light bulbs in bottom. Dimmer switch set on high.

Apples slices have cinnamon sprinkled on them. Since these are thin skinned Gravenstein apples, I did not peel them.

But I have got a question. How do you folks store your dried apples? A couple of years ago when I dried apples, I just put them in zip lock bags in a cabinet. After 2-3 months they molded.

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Wow, very cool! Have you built a home made vacuum sealer yet? :wink: I think pulling the air from your dried apples may help for long term storage, especially if you are getting mold.

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Wow. Nice dryer.
And ditto the vacuum sealer.

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Thanks for the compliments!

I built this for the purpose of drying wood back in the 90’s. It did that well. So when it came time to dry some apples, I thought why not? The only thing that I changed was that I built the screen platform. Probably has a energy efficiency rating of somewhere between zero and none but I don’t care. It drys the apples evenly, unlike the commercial dehydrator that I borrowed. Sure am glad I built it with a dimmer to control the temperature. It can get up to 130-140 F, which is too hot. I try to keep it around 115 F.

Yep, the vacuum sealer idea should work but I have wondered if that alone is best. Maybe vacuum sealing them and then putting them in the freezer. Sure was a disappointment to have the dried apples develop mold.

Here is what the apples look like this morning after turning them over and sprinkling some more cinnamon on them. They sure do shrink up.

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Well, after 26 hours of drying time I figured the apples where dry enough and so I went ahead and vacuum sealed and placed them in the freezer. Never have decided whether I like my dried apples chewy or crispy. or crunchy or what. I just know I like them to be tasty. So…

My next batch I am going to prepare it a little differently. Last week I canned several batches of spiced apple rings in Redhots Cinnamon Candy syrup. If you have never eaten spiced apples canned in this syrup, you are really missing out. Words simply cannot describe how delicious it is. So as often the case, I had 3 quarts of unused syrup left over that I stuck in the frig.

Tonight after slicing the apples, I placed the apples into large bowls with this syrup into the frig to be in there overnight. Hopefully they will soak up this syrup. In the morning I will place them in my dryer with the dimmer switch set as low as I think that I can get away with while hoping to keep the temp at as near to 105 F as I can. Hoping to not heat the Redhots Cinnamon Candy flavor out of the apples!

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They are a childhood memories from Thanksgiving! Watermelon pickle too! They look great.

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That should be delicious! The syrup might make them more on the chewy side, but yum.

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I believe you are right that the syrup will make them more on the chewy side. When I turned them over just now they seemed kind of gummy (sticky may be a better description) and not quite as dry as I expected. Am keeping the temperature around 105-110 F which is keeping it less that that of the previous batch. Nice reddish color. Some of that comes from the Redhots Cinnamon Candy but more so from the red food coloring that I added.

Doubt if a solar dryer would work very well here because of the high humidity that is always present. 72% humidity here today according to the intellicast site. I have a humidity gauge in my dryer and it gets down to around 40% (by looking thru the vent holes in the lid - don’t know how accurate it is though). But as soon as I open the lid, it goes up in a hurry.

Drying apples is a lot less work that canning apples.

Notice how reddish everything is compared to the picture above.

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Well, our tomato crop wasn’t a total loss this year despite being ravaged by first deer, and later, the usual diseases. Yesterday, I went out and picked about 25lb of the ripest tomatoes. It was tough fighting the tall weeds, which have about taken over the patch, but I got a nice basketful.

We have lots of peppers to harvest, by far our best year in that department. So, with all those mater’s and peppers, we thought we’d make some salsa. We had to add some store bought onions and cilantro, but everything else was home grown, including some garlic. Also had to add some tomato paste to thicken up the mix.

While the Mrs boiled, peeled and diced the mater’s, I got to cut up the peppers. Since we wanted to add some heat to the mix, I cut up Jalapeño’s, Serrano, Padron, pepperoncini, and the very hot Bulgarian Carrot. Also added some green bell peppers. I doubled up on the nitrile gloves and cut them outside on the deck. It was a potent mix.

We ended doing 13.5 pints of the stuff. One pint didn’t seal, so we had to use it first. It’s good, a little too thick, and frankly, not hot enough for me. But it came out alright. Don’t know how long it’ll last, but it will be nice to have this winter.

We should have a bit more tomatoes left to pick, but, those are about played out. Maybe we could get enough to can some just regular tomatoes. And, of course, we will have mucho peppers left.

Anyways, some pics of the new salsa. It took us almost all afternoon to do, but it’s worth it.

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Nothing like the taste of summer January-April. :blush:

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Feels good, doesn’t it?

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Cinnamon apple sauce and apple pie filling.

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I will be canning for the first time this year. I like to do a lot of research before I take on something especially a project that is dangerous.

I already know that if there is not enough space between the food and the lid not only can the contents leak, that can make the jar explode too, especially in a pressure canner.

Too much space between the food and lid prevents proper sealing of the jar. Cooking at a higher pressure in a pressure cooker can mean needing more space between the food and the lid.

A recipe for canning a quart will work for a half quart.

Lemon juice is a good thing to add, especially in foods too low in acidity. Sugar, salt, oil and acidity all slow down bacteria growth a lot. In the fig jam recipe that I will use I added a trace of salt, not enough to worry about healthy wise, yet enough for it to be an extra ingredient to help prevent bacteria growth, it enhances flavor a little, and is even a preservative. Not sure if I put enough to to do all that. I will see on two of those things. I will likely put some lemon zest in too which will add oil and flavor.

Of course the threads have to be cleaned to get a good seal. I bought a great canning tool kit too. With it I have no chance of burning myself unless a jar explodes. Oh and there is that, if the jars cool down to fast then they could explode. They can crack it they are cold when they are filled.

If there is not a perfect mixture of pectin, sugar and acidity then whatever a person is making will stay too liquidly.

I will update people with photos after I make the jam.

Yes, it is. We have had a good canning season with our veggies.We also want to can all those pears we picked up at the orchard a few weeks ago; they are probably ready for that.

The jar of salsa that didn’t seal is about all gone. So, guess we’ll need to pace ourselves, as we only have 12 pints left.

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Looks good. What kind of apples, and are they home grown?

Yes we used a mix of apples. Not sure what my wife put in. With two hundred apple trees we have more than we need. Deer are happy about that. Wife likes yellow apples, so my guess she used a mix of Yellows, Grimes, and Goldens

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My tip of the day:

Canning prune plums - these tend to siphon. To prevent this, leave a whole inch of headspace, then leave the jars in the canner for 5 minutes to calm down.

First batch of the season:

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Are they spiced?