Is this it for 2022?

It may only be mid-August, but my canning season only has one more round to go. Yesterday I processed twenty-five pounds of pears, which equates to twenty-three pints on the shelf. In a few weeks, I want to make applesauce and then I'm finished with big projects for this summer. Anything else I decide to do will be a small batch and not for longer-term storage in the pantry such as soups to be consumed this winter. 

Twenty-three pints of pears is a lot of pears. We enjoy them but not every day. I think it will be three years until I need to process pears again. We could simply buy canned pears, but our home canned pears don't have any additives or preservatives with names we can't pronounce, and that's important to us. 

I learned another lesson yesterday, too. I need to break down a big job into two days. I started peeling at 9:00 AM or so, and didn't take the last batch out of the canner until almost 5:00 PM. That's a long day spent on one's feet, but very worth the effort. Needless to say, I have more modest plans for today. 

This session used the last of the regular mouth pint jars I have on hand. I'm not sure if I want to get more or not. I have a Presto 23-quart canner and can stack pints when pressure canning. I've found that the wide-mouth pints are just a hair shorter and stack better. I may be better off transitioning to those when buying pints. The availability of either type of jar will probably be the deciding factor, though.  

I will also note that all twenty-three jars sealed. I've heard/seen a lot of people on YouTube complaining about Ball lids this summer. So many of the home food preservationists have jumped on the Forjars bandwagon, and why not? Forjars is sponsoring a lot of those channels, which means they're getting some advertising money from them. Unlike some, I was able to create a nice stockpile of Ball lids at the end of the 2021 canning season, so those need to be used first. I'm willing to give Forjars a try as my stash dwindles, but it won't be with sponsorship. 

Also of note, putting the rings on the jars "finger tight" doesn't work with water bath canning. The rings need to be a bit snugger. Getting that worked out may be another reason my seals are good. Putting the rings on just finger tight with the water bath method can mean the lid isn't tight enough to keep water out and that ruins the headspace in the jar and creates seal failure. We live and we learn.

It's time to get the pear jars washed, labeled, and on the shelf. I do enjoy looking at the part of my pantry that is all filled Mason jars, but being able to make a meal from what I've preserved is even better. 

The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)

Holly Tree Manor, The Hideaway, canned pears, home food preservation, pantry prep, preservative-free, a writer's life, country living, rural lifestyle, modern homestead, retirement,