- Author: Lauria Watts
I wish to make cherry pie fillings to can, and have purchased the cook-type Clearjel (aka: ClearJel, Clear Jel, CLEARJEL). Clearjel in the NCHFP pie filling recipes makes an extremely thick pie filling; some would call it gloppy, over thickened. It is all right for me, but it is a definite change in texture from what I usually get making fresh pies. I think a thickened but not quite so stand-up pie filling would be nice.
So to accomplish the thinner pie filling "thang," the hunt was on. After several searches varying words and phrases, the page "Clearjel Starch Thickener" was found on Healthy Canning.
What a great page. It is written by a Randal Oulton, from Canada. Mr. Oulton relies on approved information and recipes from the NCHFP, various USA State Universities for recipes/instructions. "Clearjel Starch Thickener" has nice depth; he cites sources extensively. It appears that he periodically reviews and makes revisions to his article as there were several dates in 2017 for accessing articles and the last date I found was November of 2017. I cannot speak for the rest of his site, but a nice job was done on this page and it answered my questions.
Very interesting. This is a great continuing education article for us all. And one last thing: always rely on and teach from approved sources, of course!
--And I hope to encourage you to make pie filling, can pie filling, make pies and eat PIES!
- Author: Darrell Fluman
It is easy to take for granted the improvements to our current produce selections made possible by decades and centuries of careful observation by farmers, nurserymen, plant breeders and even plant hobbyists.
Saturday, on my way home after checking out the latest Nashville Hot Chicken pop-up by Barts' BBQ, I stopped @ Vallarta Markets, a regional ethnic grocery chain located primarily in the San Fernando Valley.
Rainier cherries @ $2.99/lb. A great price considering most retailers hold the line @ $5.99/lb, occasionally dipping to $4.99/lb. The market was 4 pounds lighter upon my departure.
Plump, juicy, fresh, and larger than a quarter. The second picture has the quarter underneath the cherry.
I wanted to process some pitted with the stems in a brandy syrup and some in a lightly spiced syrup. I was thinking I would expedite the process by breaking out an antique cherry stoner although I already knew the answer. NO!
Cherries in the early 1900's were significantly smaller and the bulk of preserved cherries, canned and dried, were sour Early Richmond , English Morello, or Montmorency cherries. Once preferred for jams, jellies, preserves, pies, syrup, pastries and cakes, sour cherries are not the retail force today that they were in an earlier era.
When we think of cherries today, most people dream of Bing cherries or its offspring, big, dark burgundy red, and sweet.
BTW, the Bing cherry was named for Chinese national, Ah Bing, a decade's long employee who worked in the orchards of Oregon horticulturist SethLewelling.Ah Bing returned to Manchurian China in 1889 to visit family and due to the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 was never allowed to return.
My Rainier cherries would not fit in a finger operated cherry stoner, patented in 1937 by J.C. Brown. They would not feed into a 1920's, No. 50 cherry stoner by the New Standard Corp. of MT. Joy, PA. However, I could hand position each cherry individually in the well below the plunger. Say “goodbye” to speed and efficiency.
I love the ingenuity of early mechanical marvels, designed without Cad-Cam computer programs, CNC machinery, or 3-D printing.
Each design had to be mocked up by pattern makers, a specialized form of woodworking, and made into casting patterns for the foundry to cast the item in molten iron. Patterns had to be made oversize (6-9%) to account for the percentage of shrink as the cast iron cooled.
My cherry canning project is on temporary hold due to the rapid disappearance of the fresh cherry stock from my refrigerator.
It occurred to me that this is the reason why I never have any preserved cherry items to enter into the county fair.
Handful here, bowlful there, then death by attrition.
It's the pits (pun intended).
--Darrell Fluman