100 Pounds of Peaches

I bought 100 pounds of peaches last week for only $62.00.  I had to drive about 50 miles round-trip using about 4 gallons of gas.  Several friends wanted peaches, too, and they all agreed to pay an extra $1.00 for each box to help with gas.  I was delighted when enough ladies ordered to just about cover the cost of gas.  Praise the Lord for this blessing!  I had been feeling a little discouraged and unappreciated with the bulk buy coordination earlier in the summer, but He knows just what I needed.  Everyone paid the gas $1.00 without hesitation and every, single person participating in the peach purchase expressed thanks for picking up the peaches or coordinating the group, etc. I was encouraged!

100 poundsof peaches

One full box

Half a box, washed.

Blanching in boiling water

Ice water to loosen the skins. 

 I forgot to make ice so I used ice packs to keep the water cool.  Those eventually thawed so I had to get resourceful.  These sausages and some other one pound rolls of sausage did the trick!

About a half-box with skins off.

Cut up.  I added a few tablespoons of lemon juice.

I had a jar break on my very last batch of peaches.  This isn't unusual, but it's always a little disappointing. I think this time it was because the water was already boiling when I put room temperature jars into the water.  I opened the lid to take a picture (last batch and I hadn't taken a picture yet!) and I saw a lopsided jar.  Ruh-Roh!

Here's the broken jar top I pulled out. 

Here's what it looked like after the batch boiled.

 

 

 

The other jars all got sticky from the sugar water inside the broken jars so I had to wipe them all down.  I would normally dump the water and start re-heating if I had more batches to make, but luckily this was the last round.  It take a long time for that really big pot to boil!

I fished out the peaches and froze them for smoothies.

34 quarts- done.  This was 3 of the 4 boxes.

Broken Jar.

I have had jars break in a variety of ways.  I was surprised when I pulled the jar top out of the boiling water.  Usually the bottom circle falls out and the rest of the jar is intact.  This time the jar bottom didn't fall out until I tried to get the peaches out of the bottom half of the jar. 

I still have a whole box that I'm planning to freeze and/or enjoy fresh!

Katie