Canned Apple Pie Filling

Today's adventure was Apple Pie Filling.  This was a water bath canning.  First I washed about 3 dozen apples.  Different varieties to add to the flavors, some red delicious, granny smiths and golden delicious.  This was the first time I got to use the apple corer that Bob bought me about 10 years ago...............  It worked really well on the apples that were fresh and hard.  Had some trouble with it on some of the overly ripened softer red ones.  They just kind of broke apart as the spindle turned but overall it worked perfectly on most of them.  So, washed up a bunch of apples, cored them and dropped the slices into hot water with a lemon to keep the browning process down some.

You can see here how the corer took off the peel and sliced and cored the apple all at once.

After all the slices had soaked a while in the hot water/ lemon juice I loaded each jar up nearly to the top with slices.  I used the water from the soaking to make the liquid filling for each jar.  The recipe will follow.

Processed 5 Quarts in the water bath for 25 minutes.  Let them rest and then lifted each jar out onto a towel in a warm part of the kitchen to sit for at least a day before  washing each jar and removing the rings  before storing.  Should last for 18 months to 2 years in dark cool storage area.

Here's the Recipe:

3 apples per Quart jar, peeled, cored, sliced thin and soaked in warm water with lemon

5 cups of water or apple juice made liquid for 5 quart jars

Add to the water w/ lemon: 

3 cups of sugar, 1 tsp. cloves, 1 tsp. nutmeg, 1 tsp. allspice, 1 tbls. cinnamon and 1 cup of "CLEAR - JEL" for thickening.  Will add some cornstarch to each jar when I'm actually making the pie to thicken more.

Boil for 2 minutes stirring constantly until sugar is disolved. 

Pour into jars over sliced apples to 1/2 inch fill line, check for air bubbles and fill again.  Seal jars and process for 25 minutes at hard boil.