Canned Pear Slices

Our pear trees are producing a fair amount of decent fruit this year.  I'm still trying to figure out all the varieties that we have.  We definitely have a couple bartlett trees, and I believe we have a green anjou,  a comice tree, and an asian pear tree.  We also have two trees that I believe are bosc.  And I'm trying to figure out if another tree is one of the old school pear varieties with apple-shaped pears.  The bosc trees are loaded with fruit.  The others, which all ripen earlier than the bosc, have produced a fair amount.  I didn't make as many changes in the orchard this year as I had hoped to, especially with the pear trees, so I was quite impressed with the fruit that they have produced.  Some are very pretty fruit - like the bartlett pear on one of my trees pictured at left - and some are not so pretty, but it still tastes great!  That's what's important.  :) 

I've done a small amount of canning with them.  I did a test run last week, with just 3 pints.  And I'll be doing some more this week (probably tonight).  And I'll be doing more once the bosc trees are ready.  This was the first time I've canned pears.  It was fairly simple.  The most time consuming part is peeling and slicing them.  I did some research before I started and discovered that when canning pears, you shouldn't let them ripen to the point of being good to eat.  You want them to be firm.  The best way to tell if they're ready to can is to press on the top of the neck, by the stem.  If it has a slight give, they're ready.  You don't want to wait for them to ripen all the way, or you'll end up with really mushy canned pears.  I also read that you'll get a much better texture/outcome if you raw pack them.  So that's what I did.  I used a very light syrup and just followed the instructions in my Ball canning book. 

Canned Pears

Very light syrup:
1/2 cup sugar or sucanat
4 cups water

Heat sugar and water until boiling. Let simmer while you prep your pears.
Meanwhile, wash, pare, core and slice pears. Pack fruit in hot jars. Pour hot syrup over pears, leaving about an inch of head space. Process pints in boiling water bath for 25 minutes.


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