Preserving Peas

New Zealand Listener, Volume 2, Issue 34, 16 February 1940, Page 44

Preserving Peas

Dear Aunt Daisy, Would you please reply to this in The Listener? In preserving peas, what heat should they be kept at when sterilising them for one hour after bringing them to 212 degrees? I should think to boil them for three hours would make them like pea soup. I have never had any luck with preserving peas, though I have tried many times, and we grow such quantities. I am very pleased to find your page in The Listener. — cpr. Well, you see, the peas are not actually boiling for three hours in the mannet that they would be if boiled in a saucepan for dinner. It is the water in which the bottles are standing which is kept at boiling point. It is necessary to give so much sterilising to peas because they develop more bacteria even after they have been boiled. That is why peas must be sterilised two days running, so that those bacteria which have come to life after the first day's cooking, are destroyed. In the big commercial canning works, they generally do peas by a special steam-pressure method, which keeps them at a _ temperature higher than boiling point for a sufficient length of time to make them quite safe. Small " pressure cookers" for ordinary household use are sold in America, and it makes the preserving of vegetables quite a definite and safe job. Still, we manage very well in New Zealand with our ordinary screw top’ jars, standing them either in the copper, or in some vessel like a kerosene tin, with water up to within an inch or two of their tops, and covering it with a lid. You may also do them in the oven, standing them in a pan of water. On the second day the water need not quite boil, but only reach about 180 or 200 degrees. Give them three hours the first day, and one hour the second, counting from the time the water comes to the boil. Here is the method in case anyone else has missed it. Be sure to preserve only young, fresh peas. Old and hard ones will not be softened by sterilising, and will only disappoint you in the winter, when you use them. Select tender peas, shell them, and cook for five to ten minutes in boiling water. If tied in a piece of butter muslin or cheesecloth, they are easy to lift out. Plunge them into cold water for a minute or two; then pack them into jars, and fill up with boiled water, to which one teaspoon of sugar has been added to every pint. It is better to omit salt, as this has a tendency to harden the peas. Adjust the rubbers, put the lids on loosely; and in the case of (Continued on next page)

(Continued from previous page) @ spring top jar, adjust the clamp, but do not fasten it down. Pack the jars in the boiler, and sterilise for three hours. Tighten the covers of the jars, and leave to cool in the boiler for twentyfour hours. The following day, sterilise again for one hour. Put away in a cool, dry place. A lady wrote from Blenheim, saying that she was very successful in an even simpler way. She says, first cook the peas or beans, as for a meal, and leave until next day. Then fill the clean Lkottles with the peas or beans, and add the water they were cooked in. Put them in the. oven and sterilise at boiling point for three hours. Fill to overflowing with boiling water, and screw down.