Canning and More Canning

So this year I decided that canning would be a great way to add to my good storage and hey, I like doing it. Then I had to go and get really ambitious. Oh boy. Now my summer has been busy and full of work.

Some of the things I want(ed) to do are: beans,  carrots, apple juice, applesauce, apple pie filling, pears, peaches, pear jam, plum jam, apple plum sauce, apple pear sauce, pear honey,  hot pepper jelly, salsa, crabs jam, chokecherry syrup, and choke cherry jam.

Now I have just one more batch of beans. We did alright in that department. We have 45 pints and 4 quarts so far. I did get apple pie filling done. That was huge waste of time. I had gotten apples from two sources both weren't really ripe. In the end I bought apples from the store for my 6 quarts. I'll see if I can find a farmer friend for apples for the sauces.

This last I work with has given me produce and that has helped some but I do question her knowledge on what she has given me. Last night I did up what she called winter berries. They didn't quite look like our cherries, but boy when they were bubbling away in the water I could tell - pie cherries for sure! The syrup turned out good, if a little thick. Matt loves it, says it tastes like candy. This morning he woke up and the first words out of his mouth were 'French toast.' Guess what was for breakfast?

I am looking forward to this weekend. I should be done with canning things for a while. To get to my time off though I'm going to need to finish the syrup, do the last load of beans, do something with the raspberries Matt brought home last night, and finally do something with the semi-ripe apples all over my kitchen....