Peach Crazy! Canning peaches recipe

PEACHES!

In August, peaches start to ripen. Whether you pick your own or buy them from your local farmers market or produce stand, fresh peaches are a delicious summertime treat. They are one of my kids favorites, so much so that we recently planted our own peach tree. In just a couple short years and we will have our own home-grown peaches!

I went to Harry and David a when they had peaches on sale for $0.10/pound. Naturally I bought 50 pounds of peaches - for $5!! Can you believe that? In retrospect I wish I had bought more... Shoulda-Coulda-Woulda!

So as you probably guessed, my next few blogs will be recipes involving peaches! I will be canning sliced peaches today. Then I have two great peach jelly recipe's to share as well in upcoming blogs so stay tuned for those!

For now, I canned sliced peaches. I use these in all size jars, small ones that I send to school with my kids for their lunch or snack time (their teachers help open them), and large ones that I can open and use for peach cobbler, or when I have a lot of kids over there is a larger quantity of peaches to share. I don't use added sugar to my canned peaches, I feel like fruit has enough natural sugar in it, and is sweet enough that adding more is just unnecessary. (If you chose to add more for lite syrup you would use a ratio of 3 cups water/1 cup sugar).

It takes about 5 good sizes peaches or nectarines (or about 10 plums) to fill one quart jar. An average of 17½ pounds is needed per canner load of 7 quarts; an average of 11 pounds is needed per canner load of 9 pints. A bushel weighs 48 pounds and yields 16 to 24 quarts — an average of 2½ pounds per quart.

Canning Sliced (or halved) Peaches
Ingredients
*5 pounds peaches
*Canning supplies

Preparing your peaches and jars
1) Carefully wash and rinse your jars. I used both pint and quart jars this time, just make sure you process for the correct times.
2) Put the "caps" in a small pan of water on the stove and bring to just below simmer. Let them sit there, keeping hot, while you get ready to use them.
3) Bring a large saucepan filled 3/4 with water to a boil and fill the sink with cold water. This is to remove the peach skins.
4) Carefully put some peaches into the boiling water and leave the heat on high for about 20 seconds. I take mine out with a  slotted spoon. It seems to work the best. Put them into the cold sink.
5) Using your paring knife to help, slip the skins off the peaches. If the skins don't slip off easily, either the peaches are not ripe enough, or you need to scald them a little longer.

Directions
1) Slice the peaches in half and twist the two halves apart and remove the pit. You can then slice your peaches (or leave them as halves). I like to cut mine in slices because that's how my kids prefer to eat them. You can also cut them in halve, or diced in chunks, then place them into your clean jars.
2) When it is filled up to the bottom of the jar threads with water, carefully wipe off the rim of the jar with a damp clean cloth, put on the cap and screw on the ring firmly. Not too tight!
3) When the water is boiling in the water bath canner, then start counting the time. They need 25 minutes for pints and 30 minutes for quarts. Here they are after coming out of the canner.
4) Incidentally, leaving the sugar syrup out has advantages. It's less expensive to do, healthier  and they really do taste amazing. Peaches are so sweet by themselves you don't really need to add all that extra sugar. You will love it! It is also much easier and quicker to do.

I have found that when canning anything, once you get your "system" set up, it's easy. Think it through carefully, prepare everything you'll need and proceed. Enjoy!