I'm Just Peachy

I canned peaches on Friday.

It takes a lot of vessels to can peaches.

We have the pot of boiling water to sanitize the jars, the pot of boiling water to sanitize the lids and rings, the pot of boiling water to blanche the peaches for peeling, and the pot of simmering light simple syrup.

Then at the cutting station, we have the bowl of ice water for the blanched peaches, the bowl for peels (to save aside for peach honey), the bowl of pits and mushy bits, and the bowl of lemon juice water for the peach slices to take a quick bath (color retention).

I washed, blanched, peeled, cut, bathed, warmed, and jarred about 18 to 20 peaches.

And 2 1/2 hours later (which felt more like 6 1/2 hours), I had a dozen delicious-looking jars of fresh peaches. These would hold well for 12 to 18 months.  I anticipate they'll last us 12 weeks, or less.

Peach Canning recipe at PickYourOwn.org

With another 18 to 20 peaches remaining!

I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with these, until we had dinner at Nic and Kristiina's Saturday night (following a fun-filled blueberry-picking morning).  For dessert we had vanilla bean ice cream with her homemade peach "butter" drizzled over it and a sprinkle of walnuts.

Oh my!  I'll be making peach butter.  So good!  And so versatile.

Mmmmm.

Her recipe was a bit larger than what I'll do, but my plan is to use a dozen of these peaches with a cup of sugar.  Peel, slice and dump in a slow cooker with the sugar.  Let it cook on low overnight with the lid cracked.  In the morning... amazing peach butter (or peach spread... or peach syrup...)

Yay for yummy summer fruit recipes!