Where did last year go? 2021 is in the history books and so concluded our efforts to get ready for winter. I finally finished canning about the end of November, closing the season with a few canner loads of tomatoes for spaghetti sauce and tomato soup. We started the canning season doing cherries around the Fourth of July.
We put up a ton of applesauce from my in-laws’ trees as well as our own little trees which had a decent amount of apples on them. I also experimented with apple pie filling. I have frozen it in the past, but don't like having to remember to take it out ahead of time so it can thaw. One year a milk customer left us some canned apple pie filling as a Christmas gift. It was AWESOME. I just opened the jar, dumped the contents into a pie dish or casserole dish for a crisp and snap, it’s finished! Talk about convenience food!
The in-laws also have a pear tree that seriously puts out the pears, and along with our own pear trees I think we were pushing 300 pounds this year, all canned.
We also took a day this year and went and picked wild blackberries. We finally found a nice spot that is child friendly to pick.
Usually in this country you have to stand on the side of a cliff to pick or almost in the road. Neither option is really conducive for having the children help pick.
We have a large labor force to help quantify our production. We found a place down along the railroad tracks that was level with miles upon miles of blackberries to pick.
We spent several hours and came home with 15 gallons of berries. I immediately juiced them and canned it. This winter, when it is cooler, we will make blackberry jam.
The berries were awesome! They might have been best a couple of weeks earlier, but we still found plenty of ripe berries.
Of course, the youngest of the picking crew were more inclined to fill their bellies than the containers!
Then we had an awesome opportunity, through a friend at church, to get some peaches for $10 a box. It’s been almost twenty years since I found peaches for that price! They were seconds, but they were still decent, and they were PEACHES!
Next we dove into canning tomatoes, diced tomatoes for chili and such, and then spaghetti sauce and tomato soup. I usually do salsa, but the hot summer kind of took a toll on the garden and the peppers didn't do that well. These tomatoes came from one of our neighbors who grows a fabulous garden every year. It was going to freeze one night, and she wanted them cleared out quick. They had all they wanted, so they gave the rest to us, for which we were very grateful.
So, with a beef in the freezer, and potatoes and wheat in the cellar, and full jars on the shelves, we were ready for winter, with just our fire wood to finish up.
How was your canning season this year?