Homemade Jam and Lemon Juice

The CSA season is wrapping up, and this weekend I found myself with an urge to preserve. Our CSA started offering a fruit option this year, and we have had more apples than we could eat. We are not huge jam eaters, so one batch is basically enough to last us the year. Outside of the pectin, jam is also relatively easy to make using bulk ingredients. In this case, my jam was a simple recipe of apples, sugar, spices, and lemon juice.

At the end of my jam canning, I found myself with a number of left over lemons. Since I already had clean jars and hot water, and juicing lemons takes very little time, I juiced the rest to preserve as an alternative to the bottled lemon juice you buy. Since we rarely use more than a couple tablespoons at a time, I jarred it in the smallest jars I had. Canning the lemon juice was very simple following the instructions found here.

I'm still hoping to can tomatoes this year, but as usual, I am running late in sourcing them. If you know where to get flats of tomatoes at the last minute, let me know!

What canning and preserving have you done this year? Leave a comment!