Bottling Fruit – Water Bath Method

Water Bath

Any large metal container may be used for a water bather preserver.

1. Ideally deep enough to allow 50mm of water above the tops of jars, plus a little extra for boiling space.
2. It must have a metal plate (trivet) to stand jars on in the boiler
3. It can be heated by gas, stove element, or electric jug type element.

Hot Pack

The washer or peeled fruit is boiled for 3 to 5 minutes immediatey prior to packing into hot jars

Cold or Raw Pack

The fruit is peeled and/or washed thoroughly and packed into warmed jars.  Note:  With cold pack methods, as the fruit cooks up slightly, it is easy to end up with 25% or more liquid at the bottom of the jar after processing.  To minimize this effect, put together the fruit, almost squashing it in, but leaving 12mm head space.

Headspace – Hot or Cold Type Pack

Cover food with hot boiling water, syrup or brine, leaving 12mm headspace

Syrup for Preserving

Type                  Sugar (Cups)            Water (Cups)

Light Syrup              1                                      3

Medium Syrup        1                                      2

Heavy Syrup            1                                      1

To Preserve Without Sugar

Use fully ripe firm fruit, hot pack method, top up jars with hot water and process in water bath as normal.

To Keep Fruit From Darkening

1. Preparation:  Drop apples, apricots, preaches, pears etc into a solution of 2 tablespoons salt, 2 tablespoons vinegar to 4 litres of water as they are pared, cored, peeled or pitted.  Leave in solution ideally no longer than 40 minutes then rinse the fruit before packing
2. In The Jar:  ½ teaspoon Ascorbic Acid to each quart.  Sprinkle over fruit jest before capping jar.

Vegetables

1.  Must be processed at 115°C.  A pressure Cooker is the only way this can safely be attained.
2. To prevent food poisoning it can take 5 ½ to 12 hours of boiling to destroy bacteria spores.  Therefore, boiling water baths must not be used for vegetables 9Tomatoes and fruits are OK because they are acid.

Fruit Preserving Times

Note

After time is up remove jar from boiling water and stand on a folded tea towel to cool.

Altitude

To 1000ft times as above.  1000-2000ft add 10% more time.  2000-4000ft add 20% more time.