How to Can a Bushel of Peaches in 7 hours with Some Swearing, a New Pot and 29 Jars

As mentioned in last week's peach lemonade post and in our #canning play by play on twitter, we spent most of last Tuesday turning 1 bushel of gorgeous, perfect, marvellous Red Haven Ontario peaches from Bizjak Farms into 29 jars of assorted canning goodness.  

I feel like this post is a little late as once I actually got a bushel of peaches into jars I was sort of done with the whole thing for a few days. There was some swearing and lessons learned but I think I'm ready to share now.

First things First, we went to the Leslieville Farmer's Market to eat croissants and the last of our Monteforte CSA cheese curds.  I then moved on to driving the poor peach guys crazy with distracting chit chat and placed an order for a bushel of freestones (lessons from Well Preserved on this one) to be picked up the following week. I think half of twitter was at the market that day.

The next week rolled around. We went back, obtained a ridiculous amount of peaches, fed some to the babies, let everybody take some photos and then got  Ryan and Andrew to carry them to the car while I went & got more cheese curds.

So after eating a dozen and taking about 2000 photos it was time to get cracking. Or smashing as its now known. 


Growing up, canning peaches was one of the few "old fashioned" canning activities my mother did. In fact she has 4 pages of scribbly notes about it which is the 1980's equivalent to blogging.  I bet there are photos too. I have fond memories of eating these and admiring them in their jars.

Our objective was to can peaches to eat all winter. It's my seasonal depression defence strategy. Let me tell you, when you bite into a Niagara Peach in the middle of February life is good.


Really it's simple and once we got going things moved smoothly. 
Start by preparing all your jars; we did this the night before. Dallas has a good run down of safe canning practices on her post about her easy-peasy co-opertive peaches.  We used 2 dozen 1 litre wide mouth Jars.

Next make up a light syrup of 1 part sugar to 2 parts water.  We used the organic stuff in a carton so it has a darker colour which really looks nice with peaches.  I think we used 4 cartons, something like 16 cups of sugar by the end of the day. We made a big pot on fairly low heat and kept adding to it as needed. Just keep to the ratio and you're fine. 



You want to wash your peaches really well.  These were low spray peaches as organic are really hard to find especially in bulk. You want to wash off the fuzz and the pesticides. Peaches are always up there on the dirty dozen.

Next 

Blanche

Peel (we'll get back to this)

Cut (we did some halves and some quarters)

As you cut the peaches, sprinkle lemon juice on them to prevent browning.

Then add slices of peach to suryp over low heat for 5 minutes. Prep your jars and start packing hot peaches into hot jars. Cover with syrup and leave a 1/4 inch head space.

We processed for 25 minutes but processing times will depend on where you live and the size of your jars.

Blanching and Peeling was a total disaster, greatly reducing the yield and quickly raising the panic level. These perfect lovely peaches were crumbling in my hands.

2 large baskets were reduced to 7 litres of ugly frustrating peaches.  We quickly moved on to not blanching or peeling, leaving some in halves, some in quarters and had great results.  I will never ever peel another peach and haven't a clue why all the instructions and recipes I looked at were all peeling peaches.  What a mess.

Our other near-disaster was not having a large enough pot. I have canned many things but never used the giant jars before; so there I was, with hot peaches in hot jars and Ryan running out to buy a bigger pot.  I love my new giant pot.

All in all, we have some lovely peaches and learnt some valuable lessons; always make sure you have a big enough pot (this is a lesson is optimism perhaps?) and never-ever-no-way-no-how bother with blanching or peeling your peaches; especially when there are approximately 120 of them.

PS these were the last 4 peach halves and we were out of jars so this is 1 peach in one jar.  I think they're for lunch.

Wordless Wednesday: Quinoa & Beet Salad

This isn't a recipe because its so easy you don't need one.

Boil up some beets, the more colours the better. Peel and chop them up.

Add them to some quinao and a can of chickpeas with a little dressing, what ever you have in the fridge is just perfect.

delicious! and as it sits the quinoa will turn pink!

Recipe: Honey Oatmeal Blueberry Muffins

These are some of of favourite muffins and we eat quite a few of them. We have slowly been switching to organic foods in our panty so beside the salt and baking powder, the ingredients we use are all organic.  The nice thing is that it makes no difference to your baking whatsoever. 

This recipe will yield 2 dozen muffins. 12 to eat right away with spoonfuls of jam and 12 to eat for breakfast with your family.

dry ingredients:

3 cups of flour

1 cup of uncooked oatmeal

1 teaspoon salt

½ cup of sugar

4 teaspoons of double acting baking powder

wet  ingredients:

¾ cup of soft butter

½ cup of honey (coat measuring cup with a drop of oil to help with pouring)

1 ½ cups of milk

4 eggs

additions:

2 cups of blue berries.  Frozen ones work wonderfully.

Preheat oven to 350.

Combine your dry ingredients.

Mix your wet ingredients.

Add your dry ingredients to your wet ingredient ¼ cup at a time until fully mixed.  Honey is pretty magical stuff and it acts as a preservative in baking helping your muffins last longer.  We’ve been using local honey from our farmers market, the latest delicious jar from Bees Universe in Innisfil Ontario.

Fold the blue berries in to the mixture by hand.  If using frozen, dust them in flour by adding a teaspoon or so to the berries and shaking them up in a Tupperware container.  This will prevent you from making blue muffins.

Spoon into well buttered muffin trays and bake for 20-25 minutes.

Recipe: Ruby Red Rhubarb Preserves

Rhubarb is in full season so when we left the farm we also left with a cooler full of rhubarb.  

Its also hard to believe that this little plant from April...

is now lovely tender stalks of rhubarb...

So what to do with A gazillion stalks of gorgeous organic rhubarb? Make a simple preserve to eat all summer. On ice cream, on toast, on pancakes, with a spoon straight out of the jar, the possibilities are endless!

This really isn't a recipe as much as a rule.  60% fruit and 40% sugar makes a nice preserve.  In this case 4 cups of rhubarb, 2 cups of strawberries and 4 cups of organic cane sugar makes a very nice (very sweet) mix.  I also threw in 2 small empire apples just to thicken things up.

Take your fruit, chop it up, add the sugar, mix them up and then let the fruit sweat all night in the fridge.

First thing in the morning, cook it all up on the stove until its the desired consistency.  Do it right away before things get too hot.  Its almost summer, hardly the time to have 4 pots of boiling water on the stove.


Then pack and seal according to your good canning practices and pass it out to everyone you see that day.  It really is gorgeous.  

Some other great rhubarb recipes from the overwhelming internet:


Well Preserved has a great stewed rhubarb recipe that uses much less sugar,
Shana over at Folks Gotta Eat makes a mean rhubarb cake,
Kate Payne is in the middle of rhubarb fest over on her blog & you can enter the giveaway for her great book since it also discusses some great preserving basics.

Recipe: Every meal a miracle: Rhubarb Red Swiss Chard with lots of Garlic

Some nights I just can’t stand the though of making dinner.  Since I am a sucker for punishment (actually its that pesky soy intolerance) we don’t have any real instant options.

This is one of my favourite “instant” side dishes that really saves dinner. It must originally be from Jamie Oliver's Italy, now it's just in my head.

Tonight we served it with pizza (really a manchouer flat bread with cheese and garlic), it also goes really well with left over pizza as well as fish.

1 bunch of Swiss Chard (we used Rhubarb Red)

A hand full or two of spinach (optional, we are iron starved so we put spinach in everything)

Garlic to taste (we used 5 cloves)

A few glugs of olive oil

Either the juice of a whole lemon or 3 tablespoons of lemon juice

Salt and Pepper

Even the future compost looks good.

Wash the chard and spinach, paying special attention to get rid of any sand. 

Trim the ends off the chard.  

Blanche it for 2 minutes in boiling water.

While it’s boiling, pour 2 big glugs of olive oil into your wok or sauce pan. 

Turn it on to medium heat.  

Finely chop your garlic and toss it in the oil.  

Should be time to drain the greens.  

As soon as the garlic starts changing colour, toss in those greens.  

Add the lemon juice and salt and pepper. 

Mix it up every once and a while for about 5 minutes and volia! Italian greens! So fancy.  Looks like you have been slaving away over the stove all day, not that you could barely face the thought of making dinner.  

As my mother would say, “Every meal a miracle”.  Now call it a day.

Soup Swap Recipe: Anna, Jeff and Papa Bear's Lentil Soup

My cousin Anna and her husband Jeff brought this amazing soup to our swap.  Everybody loved it, especially the people who are pregnant or just learning to eat solids.  It apparently blew the babies' minds.

Its so easy too.  Two guests have already made it for themselves.

Anna, Jeff and Papa Bear's Lentil Soup

1 qt Vegetable stock
1 qt Water
1 lb Dried lentils, washed and picked over
2 medium Potatoes, peeled and diced
2 medium Onions, diced
2 Tomatoes, peeled, seeded and quartered
2 large Carrots, peeled and diced
3 Cloves of Garlic, minced
1 tsp dried Oregano
1/2 c Olive oil
Salt and Pepper to taste

In a large pot, bring soup stock and water to a boil. Add all the other ingredients at once.

Bring to a boil; continue boiling for 15 minutes. Then simmer over low heat for hour and it’s done.

Ta Da!  Delicious!

Soup Swap Recipe: Poppy's Curried Carrot & Apple Soup

So many good soups!  I am actually eating this one as I type this great veggie soup recipe out for you.
Rebecca too, but her's has some brown rice baby cereal mixed into it to make it easier to eat.

Poppy's Curried Carrot & Apple Soup

2 tsp sunflower oil
1tbsp curry powder
11/4lb (500g) chopped carrots
1 large chopped onion
1 large chopped apple
4 cups (1L) vegetable stock
salt & pepper
chopped parsley

Heat oil in a large, heavy pan and gently fry curry powder for 2-3 minutes.

Add chopped carrots, onion, and apple.  Stir until well coated with the curry powder, then cover the pan.

Cook over low heat for 15-20 minutes, until softened.

Spoon the vegetables into food processor or blender.  Add half the stock and blend until smooth.

Return to pan and pour in remaining stock.  Bring soup to a boil and adjust seasoning to taste.  Garnish with parsley.

So Delicious!

Mmm Mmm Marla's Mushroom Mash!

Here's another one of my talented friend's delicious Soup Recipe. We are trying to name them as we eat them and Mmm Mmm Marla's Mushroom Mash! is certainly fitting. The exclamation point is part of the title.

So straight from Marla, how to make one of the best soups I've ever tasted:

First, I took enough of the garlic cloves you get in the big bags from Chinatown to cover the bottom of a 9" pie plate, and roasted them slowly covered in olive oil until they were gorgeous and smushy and sweet.

That went in the bottom of my soup pot, to which I added a little more olive oil, a good hunk of butter, three medium onions, coarsely chopped. I simmered that for 10 - 15 minutes, until the onions were golden and there were starting to be lovely little browned crusty bits of garlic skating around the bottom.

While that was happening, I took four large sweet peppers, sliced and roasted them under the broiler until the skins were black and easy to peel off.

Then, I chopped about a grocery bag full of various mushrooms, plus about six large Portobello mushrooms and added them to the pot, and liberally salted, peppered and added a handful of Emeril's Rustic Rub (you can google the recipe for that, or choose your own spices). At that time I added the peeled roasted peppers.

This simmered, with occasional stirring, for about 50 minutes until it cooked down quite a bit.

Now, here is where I would normally have added vegetable stock - but since I didn't have any but PC Organic (which has wheat and soy ingredients), I tried water.

But you should add vegetable stock, and let it simmer another ten minutes at least.

Use a stick blender, or transfer to to a regular blender, and puree until as smoooth or as chunky as you like, and cook a little longer.

Add cream and more butter to taste, and more rub to taste.

Now, because we had to be gluten-free for the swap, it still tasted too thin with the water, and I panicked. So, I cooked down another big bag of mushrooms, more onions, butter, rub, roasted and fresh garlic and added extra garlic powder, plus a whole bunch of chopped parsley and the rinds from some Parmesano Reggiano, and added that in and mixed it all with the stick blender, added it in and re-mixed it all together. That made it better - but veg stock is what I needed.

Soup Swap Recipe: Catherine's lemony-not-like-chilli Black Bean Soup

This week I will be sharing all our delicious vegetarian soup recipes from our soup swap.


Enjoy!

Catherine's lemony-not-like-chilli Black Bean Soup (from Laurel's Kitchen)


1 1/2 cups black turtle beans
1 1/2 quarts/litres vegetable stock
2 T oil
1 carrot
1 onion
1 potato
2 stalks celery
1 bay leaf
1 t oregano
1/4 t savoury
2 t salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper
Juice of 1 lemon
1/2 lemon, thinly sliced

Wash the turtle beans and put them in a saucepan along with the stock and 1 T oil. 


Cover tightly, bring to a boil, and simmer for 2 1/2 hours or so, until beans are quite tender.

Chop the onion and saute in the remaining oil until soft. 


Chop the celery, including the leaves. 


Grate potato and carrot on a large grater. 


Add celery, potato, and carrot to onion and cook over medium heat for several minutes, stirring all the while. 


Add the vegetables to the beans, along with the seasonings, in the last hour of their cooking. 


Bring the soup to a boil and lower the heat to simmer until the beans and vegetables are done.

Add the lemon juice

Add lemon slices when the soup has finished cooking.

Makes about 9 cups.

Recipe: Really Really Dill Pickles

After posting the photos of the pickles I’ll be giving to friends and family over the holidays, I realized that I never got around to posting the recipe for these great dill pickles.

This recipe is adapted from the Complete Book of Small Batch Preserving Favourite Dill Pickles recipe.  I doubled this recipe without any issues.  I used the 8 & 16 oz Ball Jar Elite, which are sort of a funny shape for pickles, hence the untraditional dill slices.  They’re a hit though, excellent on or with a sandwich. This recipe should make about 8  x 16 oz jars, the spicing is written out for the 16 oz jars, just half it for the smaller ones.

Although I really like the taste and the crispness is fine, next year I’ll brine them over night in the refrigerator. It just makes a better pickle and its really not that much extra work.

16-20 small pickling cucumbers (about 3lbs/1.5kg)

2 cups white vinegar

2 cups water

2 tbsp pickling salt

1 tbsp granulated sugar

1 head of fresh dill per jar

1 small clove of garlic per jar          

1/2 teaspoon of mustard per jar

 Cut your cucumbers up into the desired shape, slices, hunks, it doesn’t mater.

Combine vinegar, water, salt and sugar in a large stainless steel or enamel saucepan and bring to a boil.

Prepare your hot jars. Place 1 head fresh dill, 1 clove garlic (I used the little bit of garlic I grew this year) and ½ teaspoon of mustard seeds (I found two different colours at the Big Carrot, their organic spice section is phenomenal) in each pint jar. 

Pack cucumbers into jars and pour boiling vinegar mixture over cucumbers to within ½ inch of rim.  Process for 10 minutes.  Please be mindful to follow good canning practices and don’t eat anything that you suspect hasn’t been processed properly.

I’m really pleased with these pickles.  They really pack a punch.  Even though I reduced the spice in the small jars, they’re really dilly.