I dont know where to put this one, but here it is. A friend has two old pear trees and they did quite nicely this year despite the drought. She gave me lots of pears from her trees, and I have been busy canning them up. So far, I have 8 1/2 qts of pear slices, 7 1/2 qts of pear sauce, and 10 1/2 pints of pear butter, and a lot more to can up. My pear tree did not do well this year. The pears it did get were barely golf ball size and rotted quickly on the tree. I tossed them in my fields, and maybe in a few years I will have more pear trees. I think it has to do with a well meaning, but unskilled friend with a chainsaw cutting the top off. I hate having my trees beheaded like that when the power company does it; and it isnt any better when a friend does it by mistake. His wife did not catch him quickly enough. That was more than 3 or 4 years ago, and it has not had a decent pear crop since. I will give it some good rotted horse manure this fall, and hope it recovers. One of these days, I am going to get him a book on proper tree pruning. Anyhow, I will get back to my pictures as soon as I can. I have a lovely large pumpkin to do up also. I was just reading on Mother Earth News that the USDA says not to home can pumkins, but they can be frozen? moderator's note: moved topic to more appropriate forum
Anightowl, I don't know why pumpkin shouldn't be canned at home, but I do know it freezes really well. I cut a pumpkin in half, scrape out the seeds and stringy stuff, and place it on a lipped cookie sheet (jelly roll pan) and bake it at 350 until it caves in (time depends on the size of the pumpkin). Then after it cools a bit, scoop out the meat and put it in a food processor to make a puree. Freeze the puree. When you thaw it, there will be a bit of "pumpkin water", which I drain off. A pie, cake, or any baked good made with this pumpkin is much better than the canned pumpkin. Canned pumpkin has been baked twice before you use it--the frozen, only once.
I freeze pumpkin every fall too. If the weather is cool enough I cook it in the oven, otherwise I have a food steamer (looks like a double boiler but the top section has holes in the bottom) that I use. When the pulp is really soft, set it on cookie cooling racks over a towel to catch drips. When cool the pulp slips off the skin real easy by hand or you can use a spoon. I don't have a food processor so I just freeze it as is. I put 2.5 cups in each baggy since most recipes call for 2 cups and you loose some of the measure when you thaw it out and have the 'water' to drain off. It keeps in the freezer for a year or two without any problems.
Many years ago the USDA changed their recommendation, determining that the temperature during the canning process could not be guaranteed to reach the necessary level to kill any/all botulism spores, 240°F. Even under pressure. variations in density of the pumpkin butter left enough doubt to sustain the recommendation. The National Center for Home Food Preservation concurred and so freezing is the accepted preservation methodology. Jerry
I hope your pear tree survives and produces many, well formed fruits for you in the years to come. What a pity your friend chain sawed it though as trees grow from the top. Maybe it will put out side shoots for you. Fingers crossed.
The article said something about temps in home canning not being high enough. However, I know a lot of people who do home canning, and they have canned their own pumpkin for years with no ill results. I have canned my own pumpkin before, and it was fine. I do not own a canner pot, but use the open kettle method instead. I have never had any problems except the one time I tried Kerr lids. I had used mixed lids from Kerr, Ball, Red Dot, and few others. The only ones that spoiled were the Kerr lids, so I no longer use their lids. The spoilage with Kerr lids was 99 to 100%, while I rarely have spoilage with any other brand. Of course, they claimed my canning was at fault, not their lids. I do not believe them. I hope my pear tree recovers and does well too. I will keep it anyhow. And maybe some of the seeds from these pears will also grow new pear trees.
AA, you must have had a bad batch of lids. Whereas I used ball a couple years ago and they bulged in the kettle I was so disgusted. So I use what I buy and don't stress too much about the brand.
I'm glad I decided to check the search engine on here to see if anyone had mentioned how to process a pumpkin instead of asking. All the information I needed was already in this post. A big thanks to all of you.
It is recommended not to can pumpkin puree, but you can do pumpkin cubes. Apparently puree is too dense to allow temperature during the canning process to reach the necessary level to kill any botulism spores. I would rather be safe than sorry, so it's cubed pumpkin canned or pureed pumpkin frozen.
