Putting Up Peaches

Our local Farm Market had the BEST peaches this year.  Every time I got one, it was perfect!  I had to keep them for the rest of the year.  I consulted my good friend, Mandy, and she told me how to freeze peaches without using syrups or additives.  It worked wonderfully. 

The first step is to clean out a shelf in the freezer.  Then I placed a large cookie sheet lined with parchment or aluminum foil on the shelf.  I then place my cooling rack on the large sheet and placed a smaller cookie sheet on top of the cooling rack.  This gave me 2 surfaces to work with. 

The next step was blanching, bathing, peeling, slicing, and freezing the peaches.  I brought a pot of water to a boil.  Put the peaches in it for about 30 seconds, removed them from the boiling water and directly put them into an ice water bath. 

 Now you need to start working quickly.  As soon as I peeled off the skin, which comes off really easy, I quickly pitted and sliced them onto a plate an immediately placed the slices onto my prepared cookie sheets in the freezer. 

Try to keep them as separated as possible.  Working quickly at this and doing them one at a time reduced the time for oxidation and discoloration.

I let them freeze for a good hour or so and then placed the frozen slices in zippered freezer bags.  They're beautiful and set to last all year! (We'll see how long they last.  My girls are still begging for them!)