It’s my favorite time of year! CANNING TIME! My fondest memories are canning with friends (remember all of those crock pots with apple butter? LOL!) I’ve come to realize that most people are scared canning is a lot of work, because it is when you do it by yourself….which is also why you should NEVER do it by yourself. Get together with some friends, let the kids play while you chat, laugh, and can something delicious like this Roasted Pepper Pasta Sauce.
Now, this year I did something I’ve never done before–CHICKEN! I happened upon an amazing chicken sale where I was able to get it for only 60 cents a pound. So of course, I jumped in and bought 80 pounds of it! Can you believe it? It was also my first time pressure canning by myself, and I’m proud to announce that I only had one jar that didn’t seal and my house didn’t blow up, so I’m calling it a total success. LOL! I also cooked and froze 40 lbs of chicken. Honestly though, it’s amazing to have so much chicken already prepped for meals and it’s already proved a huge life saver as life gets busy again with school in session.
And of course, as many of you may remember, I’m a CANBASSADOR for Sweet Preservation-and Northwest Cherry Growers helping spread the good word about canning and putting up the harvest, including great recipes and ideas for canning. (So food storage appropriate!) So every year they send me some fruit from the great state of Washington. But I have to tell you when I got these cherries in the mail, I had a super hard time not eating them. They were picked at the peak of freshness and were huge! I’m talking one inch wide! Okay, maybe I did have a few…I had to make sure they were edible for canning!
I love canning cherries! The process is really simple. Just pit the cherries (I love this pitter, check it out HERE)
See that new cherry pitter behind my bowl of pitts? It was awesome, so easy my five-year-old pitt the cherries! But it can be a little messy, wear aprons for sure! Then make a simple syrup from water and sugar (ranging from heavy to light, I made mine light because the cherries were so sweet).
Then fill the jars with cherries and syrup, leaving 1 inch head space.
And process in a water bath canner for the specified amount of time.
Voila! I love canning fruit, it’s so easy and my kids love to help! These cherries are legit and very yummy! You can use them to make authentic Black Forest Torte cake (you know in Germany they use sweet canned cherries not the pie filling made from sour cherries that us Americans use) or to make this ultra yummy salad I made.
Yep…that’s blue cheese, candied pecans, canned cherries over a bed of arugula and romaine lettuce topped with my favorite white balsamic vinaigrette. Super YUMMY!
In addition to canning, I also decided to freeze a few to use in smoothies, homemade ice cream, etc. (Oh, and some strawberries that we weren’t eating fast enough from my fridge). Super easy to do, I just washed, dried and laid them flat on a cookie sheet to freeze for a few hours before transferring them to a Ziploc bag. I’ve already used them in homemade Cherry Chocolate Chip ice cream and it was SO GOOD! What a blessing it is to be able to put up the harvest for a rainy day!
If you’re looking for more recipes for canning, be sure to check out Sweet Preservation for some great ideas!
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