Why Lynn cans apples
Apples cost so much that Lynn did not want the ones she had to go to waste, so she cans them to have in the months to come for apple pies, fried apple pies, or apples over ice cream. She starts with the fruit already washed and piled in a big dish pan, cores it with a little utensil Travis got, then peels and slices it. The whole batch is on the video page.
The peeling and coring turns out to be the long part of the day. When she comes back to the camera she says it was a bigger job than she expected, with peelings all over the place. While she was cleaning up, Travis came through and asked her to save the cores because he might make apple brandy out of them.
The lemon water that keeps them from browning
Before she cuts anything, Lynn mixes the water the slices will sit in. She adds one cup of lemon juice to three gallons of water, then puts ice in it to get the water good and cold. She says that cold, lemony water is what keeps the apples crisp while she cuts them up and keeps them from turning brown.
It works. When the peeling is finally done she holds the apples up to the camera and points out that they are still not turning brown, and she gives the credit to the lemon juice in that bucket of water.
The sugar and cinnamon syrup
The canning liquid is a sweet syrup, and its whole job is to season the fruit in the jar. To her three gallons of water Lynn adds two cups of sugar per gallon along with cinnamon, and she says that once they are canned the apples are already seasoned, so all you do is open a jar and make an apple pie with them.
At the pot she counts it out again and corrects herself on camera: it is six cups of sugar for the three gallons and one tablespoon of cinnamon per gallon, not the teaspoon she said the first time. She keeps it at about a medium heat, warm rather than hot, because it is going into cool jars with the apples, and warm is enough to melt the sugar and let the cinnamon dissolve on its own, which she tastes and says will be like a fresh apple pie.
Filling the jars
With the jars lined up and the apples ready, Lynn starts packing them in with a measuring cup, and she notes again that the lemon juice kept the slices from browning while she worked. She packs them a little tight on purpose, because the apples shrink a little when they cook down in the canner, so a slightly tight pack makes sure there is enough fruit in each jar.
The batch filled 18 quart jars, and the syrup, which she says is more like a flavored syrup than a brine, goes over the apples after that.
Into the canner
Once the lids and rims are on, the jars go into the pressure canner, and her method here is short on purpose. She lets the canner come to pressure, and as soon as it hits pressure and starts thumping she cuts it off, then leaves the jars sitting in the closed canner until it cools down and the seal comes back down so she can open it. She says she does it that way so the apples do not overcook. She does not give a processing time or a pressure weight on camera.
While she waits she points out the little red piece popping up on the canner, which tells her the thumping is only a few minutes off. When the jars come out they are too hot for her to handle by herself and already sealing, and looking them over she figures the batch will last the family a year, with fried apple pies on some weekends.
For canning and preserving, follow Lynn's video together with current tested guidance from your national or state extension service.