Cherry Pie Filling and Cherry Preserves

I had to write about my latest cooking escapade - canning cherries. I'd never done it before in my life, but when you get a canner for Christmas and have friends begging you to pick as many cherries from their tree as you can, then you get me - completely amitious. I think everything turned out rather well and I'm so proud of myself! I'd say that canning the preserves is far easier than canning pie filling because preserves requires chopping the cherries up in a food processor while the pie fililng requires you to blanch the cherries in water and to keep them hot while you make the filling. Yikes! I was surprised I had enough bowls.

Also, one important note: If you are ever going to make homemade fresh or canned pie filling don't use cornstarch! I mean it. Just don't. I canned apple pie filling last year using cornstarch and now it is all clumpy and separated. Instead, you should use this wonderful product called modified corn starch. It makes the most amazingly smooth and thick pie filling - just like you'd pour out of a can. It's just so much easier to work with and it's a lot more stable for canning. Give it a try! (I found it in the grocery aisle with the regular cornstarch.)

Anyway, here are some pictures:

The Cherries. Aren't they beautiful?

The pitted cherries floating in water and lemon juice. (Pitting takes a long, long time!)

I didn't get a picture of the cooking cherries, but here is the pie filling in the canner. Because of our elevation they had to cook for 40 minutes!

The finished cherry pie filling with a small jar of cherry preserves on the right. You can tell a big difference between the pie filling where I used water (on the left) and where I used cherry juice (in the middle). The flavor was quite different too. I can't wait to see how different they taste in a pie or a crisp! Yummy!

If anyone is interested in the recipes I used, just let me know. I have to transcribe it with my notes from the huge and overly detailed webpage from where I got it.

***And a BIG thank you to Clair and Damon for donating their cherries to me! :-) ***