Last week while in Eastern, Wa. I bought a 24 pound box of Sno-King White Peaches. Why? Because it was only $8.50 and they're yummy! Once home of course I had to figure out what to do with them and after a little (okay a lot) of searching sites I settled on my first recipe: Peach Butter. Apple Butter is delicious, so I expected this to be too.
I started with just over 4 pounds of ripe peaches. I washed them, halved them, removed the pit and then quartered them. What I was left with was 4 pounds and they looked like this.
At this point I added a cup of water and simmered them for 25 minutes until they were soft. Next came the part I decided not to take pictures of - the blender. Now nothing bad happened, I let them cool down slightly, split it into 3 batches and ran them through the smoothie cycle on our Blendtec. What I ended up with was a light pick peach soup, that I then poured back into the pan. At this point I also added the juice of one lemon, a heaping teaspoon of cinnamon and 3/4 cup brown sugar.
Now came the hard part - stirring. Not just a little, but a lot...like 45 CONSTANT minutes of stirring while it cooked on medium-low heat. My fingers and arm went numb several times, but if I stopped stirring it would stick and burn and ruin all my hard work up to this point.
Now after all that stirring and cooking, I was left with just a little more than half the peach butter I started with and I knew it was done by the ribbons that stayed on top after drizzling them from the spatula. (If you look above you can see them) At this point I removed it from the heat and let it start to cool down before ladling into jars.
And TA-DA! This is what 4 pounds of peaches will get you - 3 pints (plus a little extra) of yummy, delicious, eat with a spoon Peach Butter. One is going straight to the fridge and the other two into the freezer, although I don't expect they'll be there long. Now what do I do with the other 20 pounds.....
*Forgive the not so great pictures, I do have a real camera, but the iPhone is just so dang handy.
Now came the hard part - stirring. Not just a little, but a lot...like 45 CONSTANT minutes of stirring while it cooked on medium-low heat. My fingers and arm went numb several times, but if I stopped stirring it would stick and burn and ruin all my hard work up to this point.
Now after all that stirring and cooking, I was left with just a little more than half the peach butter I started with and I knew it was done by the ribbons that stayed on top after drizzling them from the spatula. (If you look above you can see them) At this point I removed it from the heat and let it start to cool down before ladling into jars.
And TA-DA! This is what 4 pounds of peaches will get you - 3 pints (plus a little extra) of yummy, delicious, eat with a spoon Peach Butter. One is going straight to the fridge and the other two into the freezer, although I don't expect they'll be there long. Now what do I do with the other 20 pounds.....*Forgive the not so great pictures, I do have a real camera, but the iPhone is just so dang handy.
A few items used worth mentioning:
- My Ozeri Pro Digital Kitchen Food Scale worked great at weighing all the peaches out.
- When we invested in our Blendtec Blender I knew it would come in handy and this time it allowed me to skip the process of removing the peach skins.
- I ran across these Ball Plastic Jar Lids by accident in the grocery store and now I love them! They're great for those times when you aren't going to can, but want to store a sauce, salsa, etc. in the fridge or freezer for a short time.
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