Peach Preserves (And What It Really Looks Like To Make Them.)

I love peaches. I will eat them any way I can get them, but I especially love fresh peaches. There is nothing better than washing and eating a fresh peach right over the sink. It is like a good tomato sandwich. If you aren’t careful, you will end up wearing as much as you eat.

Nashville is not really peach country, but with all the farmers’ markets, we can usually get enough to eat or even make a pie or a cobbler. But, to make preserves, you need a bushel or two, and I am not willing to pay Nashville farmers’ market prices for a bushel. So, recently when we were driving from Florida to Nashville, we stopped at a farm stand just north of Tifton, Georgia and bought a bushel box.

I went to Pinterest for a recipe. Each one I saw had beautiful photos of rich, ripe peaches, clean countertops, well-manicured hands stirring bubbling preserves, and shining jars waiting to be given as gifts. I am not a food blogger, so I didn’t even think to take pictures until halfway through the process. You will have to trust me when I say that the hours spent peeling, slicing, and pitting the peaches made the mess you see in the pictures I did manage to take. I planned to freeze peaches for pies and make up the rest into preserves. Both recipes called for twelve peaches. Once I had them sorted, I was sorry I had not bought two bushels. It hardly seemed worth it to go through all that trouble for three pies and three batches of preserves. We may have eaten a few of the peaches before I began to put them up.

I peeled the peaches by dropping them in boiling water for about a minute, then into ice water. In most cases, the peel comes right off, leaving you a very slick, drippy, slippery peach that you then have to pit and slice without cutting off a finger. It is not as glamourous as it sounds.

I didn’t start until 3 pm. Big mistake. Making preserves is a marathon. By the time I got the peaches peeled, pitted and sliced, it was well after 5 pm. There was no stopping. Peeled peaches don’t keep, so I powered through. I have learned (the hard way) to not only make sure I have everything I need when I begin to cook,bake or can, but to go on and measure it out and have it ready. There is no time to find pectin or measure sugar once fruit hits the stove. The recipe had a note that said, “Check to make sure your pectin is not expired.” Who knew pectin expired? As it happens, almost all my pectin had expired. I had just enough for three batches and now know not to stockpile pectin. I have also learned (again, the hard way) not to double recipes that involve pectin. It is better to make multiple batches of the suggested amount. However, there is no reason you can’t make those batches almost simultaneously.

By 6 pm, I had three bags of peaches in the freezer and three pots of sliced peaches cooking on the stove. The recipe said to “cook for twenty minutes or until they liquify.” I want to know what temperature that cook used to get those peaches done in twenty minutes. After about forty-five minutes I decided I liked chunky preserves and they were done enough.

In the midst of all this, Evans came in to cook dinner, because the man is a saint. He also had to hoist my water filled canning pot to the stove since I can’t lift it. So, we are both at the stove, I have a giant pot of water boiling to sterilize the canning jars, and I am stirring three separate pots of peaches. I am also adding up cups of peaches plus cups of sugar to get an idea how many jars I will need. I should have checked my stash of jars when I checked sugar and pectin.

When I decided the peaches were done enough, I dumped them all into a big bowl, I quickly ate the dinner Evans had cooked then started again. While the recipe called for 12 peaches, now it said to remeasure and only use six cups. Some of my peaches must have been small, because I had enough for two full batches, and about a third left over. I froze the leftovers assuming they could be added to pies or tarts later.

The actual making of the preserves goes very fast, which is why you need to have everything ready. I had just enough jars to hold the two batches that I finished.

By 8 pm, I had eight pints of preserves and I was probably wearing another pint of peach juice. I was amazed at all the places I had spilled, splashed and dripped juice. I was extremely glad I had only purchased one bushel of peaches.

I thought about trying to be all gracious and pretend that I am one of those ladies who looks great while cooking and nothing is an effort. Nope. If you eat my peach preserves, I want you to know that it was a lot of work, took all day, made a huge mess, and I really love you if I share.