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How To Preserve Food

Preserving food is a fun and economical way to enjoy good food long after harvest season is finished. There is some basic knowledge required to help in understanding the process of preserving methods and to make preserving food safe. The key to enjoying preserved foods is to start with high quality, fresh products.

Freezing Fruit

Peaches can easily be frozen. Wash the whole peach and just put in the freezer, skin and all. When you’re ready to eat them, simply put them in the microwave for 30-45 seconds and they're ready to eat. You can freeze peaches in another way by putting the whole peaches in boiling water for 1 minute. Take them out and immediately put them into cold water so they don’t cook. This allows the skin to be peeled off easily. Peel and cut them in half and remove the pit. Soak them for 2 minutes in a cold water solution with 6 crushed vitamin C tablets or a couple of tablespoons of lemon juice, to prevent discoloring of the fruit. Drain and put them in baggies, seal and freeze.

Canning

You can store foods for a long time using the heating and sealing system of canning. The amount and method of heat processing used depends mainly on the acidity in food. Foods are categorized into Low Acid and High Acid foods. Low acid canned foods contain too little acidity to prevent the growth of heat-resistant bacteria. Acid foods contain enough acidity to block their growth or destroy them more rapidly when heated. The term “pH” is a measure of acidity, the lower its value, the more acid the food. The acidity in foods can be increased by adding vinegar, lemon juice, or citric acid. Acid foods have a pH of 4.6 or lower. They include fruits, pickles, sauerkraut, jams, jellies, marmalades, and fruit butters. Although tomatoes usually are considered an acid food, some have pH values slightly above 4.6. Therefore, if they are to be canned as acid foods, tomatoes must be acidified by adding lemon juice or citric acid. Examples of Low Acid foods include most vegetables, meats and seafood.

We’ll restrict our attention to high acid food preserving using the water bath boiling process, as this is the method for canning peaches. By heating filled and sealed jars, a vacuum is created upon cooling which keeps out air and preserves food for a long time.

Basically, the canning practice includes:

Carefully select fresh food
Wash foods; peel if necessary
Hot pack or raw pack foods
Add acids(vinegar or lemon juice) to some foods
Use acceptable jars and self-sealing lids.
Process jars in a boiling water canner for the correct period of time
Properly cool and store jars of canned food

Equipment

You can expect to invest about $37 in equipment to start canning, assuming you buy everything new. You will need:

Hot Water Bath Canner( $17)

Jar Lifter($6.50)

Funnel($2)

Case(12 jars) Wide Mouth Jars($9)

Box(12 lids) Wide Mouth Lids($3)

Preparation of Jars and Self-Sealing Lids

Regular Mason-type, threaded, home-canning jars with self-sealing lids are the best choice. They are available in half-pint, pint, quart or half-gallon sizes. Wide mouth jars have 3 inch openings, making them more easily filled and emptied. Don’t use non-canning jars. Their glass may not be able to withstand the heat without breaking. Wash the jars in hot water with detergent and rinse well by hand or wash in a dishwasher. When filled jars are processed less than 10 minutes in boiling water, they must be pre-sterilized before use. This is done by filling the canner with water and boiling the empty jars for 10 minutes, and use immediately to fill with food.

You can reuse all canning jars, but buy new sealing lids each time to insure a good seal.

Headspace

This is where most canners make a mistake. A certain amount of headspace must be allowed in all canned foods. This is the space in the jar between the underside of the lid and top of the food or its liquid. Some foods, especially those that are starchy, swell more in the jars than others, and therefore, require more headspace. If too little headspace is allowed, the food may expand and bubble from the jar during processing. If too much headspace is allowed, the food at the top is likely to discolor in storage because the headspace will contain more residual oxygen. After filling the jars with food, release the bubbles by inserting a flat plastic spatula between the food and the jar to insure proper headspace.

Assuring a Good Seal

When you remove the hot jars from a canner, do not retighten their lids. Retightening the lids may cut through the gasket and cause seal failures. Cool the jars at room temperature for 12 to 24 hours. Test the seal by one of two methods:

Press the middle of the lid with a finger or thumb. If the lid springs up when you release your finger, the lid is unsealed.
Tap the lid with the bottom of a teaspoon. If it makes a dull sound, the lid is probably not sealed. It should make a "ping" sound.
Hold the jar at eye level and look across the lid. The lid should be concave (curved down slightly in the center). If the center of the lid is either flat or bulging, it may not be sealed.

Processing time is determined by altitude. The higher the altitude where you live will increase the processing time.

Good Luck and Have Fun!

Try these peach preserving recipes: