Fun with Peaches!
The last couple of days have been super busy, but productive! As of this evening, we are the proud owners of a brand new air conditioning unit! And not a moment too soon considering the epic heat we are supposed to see here this weekend.
The storms are making for an amazing landscape, and the plants are all super happy! Here's a pic from last night...
I also found some peaches at an incredible price and couldn't resist picking them up! Spent the day processing them and man did we get a pretty nice amount of preserved food!
13 pints of peach jam
11 pints of peaches in light honey syrup
6 pints and 5 half pints of peach habanero jam
You can find all the recipes below!
Peach Jam
This is the recipe I made - ingredients can be reduced or increased based on the number of peaches you have.
7 cups skinned, pitted and chopped up peaches
7 cups of sugar
2 boxes of pectin (I used one low sugar and one regular in an effort to reduce the amount of sugar in this recipe)
4 Tbsp lemon juice
2 tsp butter (salted or unsalted - doesn't matter)
After peeling the peaches, pitting and chopping, add them to a heavy bottomed saucepan. Add the lemon.
Bring the mix to a boil over medium high heat, mashing as you go, with the back of your spoon. (Feel free to really pulverize it if you don't like big chunks in your jam - you could even hit it with an immersion blender if you'd like)
Once a boil is achieved, stir in the pectin and the butter. Bring back to a full boil (meaning the bubbles don't stop if you stir it), and stir for one full minute. Once the minute is up, remove the pan from the heat.
Skim any foam from the top, and add to your prepared canning jars.
Process in a water bath canner for 10 minutes or store in your refrigerator.
Canned Peaches
This recipe uses a very lightly sweetened syrup. You will need:
1/2 cup of honey for every 12 cups of water. The amount of syrup needed is dependent on the number of peaches you are using. For the 11 pints of peaches we canned, we used the 1/2 cup honey and 12 cups of water.
Peel peaches, cut in half to remove the pits, and then cut each half into fourths. In a saucepan, add 12 cups of water and 1/2 cup of honey. Bring to a boil to create a syrup. This syrup is very lightly sweetened, but the syrup will help preserve the color and flavor.
Add cut peaches to the syrup and return to a boil. Once a boil is achieved, turn off the heat.
Put the peaches and syrup into prepared pint jars and add 3/4 tsp of lemon to each pint. (Add 1 1/2 tsp of lemon to each quart)
Process in a water bath canner as follows:
Quart - 25 minutes
Pint - 20 minutes
If your altitude is over 1000 (like mine is) - add 5 minutes of processing time to each of the times listed above.
Habanero Peach Jam
This recipe makes 12 pints of Jam
1 Tbsp lemon
6.5 cups of peeled, pitted and chopped peaches
6.5 cups of sugar
6 Habanero peppers - cut, deseeded and diced. If you'd like it spicier, add more peppers or leave the seeds in. (We didn't think it was too spicy and will add more peppers next time)
To a heavy bottomed saucepan, add the peaches, sugar and diced peppers. Mash everything together and let sit for about 45 minutes.
Bring the mix to a boil and boil for 20 - 30 minutes, skimming the foam off the top, until the jam coats the back of a spoon, when a spoon is tipped sideways.
Add the finished jam to prepared jars and process in a water bath canner for 10 minutes (for pints)
We enjoy this on top of cream cheese, and spread on crackers, as an appetizer or quick and easy snack.
Jason has big plans to add this to barbeque sauce, and as a glaze on grilled meats! We'll keep you posted!
