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How to make and bottle your own homemade canned Lemon juice, or other Citrus juice

How to Make Homemade/ Home-canned Lemon Juice

Making and canning your own lemon juice is easy.  Here's how to make your own home canned citrus juice, complete instructions in easy steps and completely illustrated. The lemon juice will taste MUCH better than anything you've ever had from a store, and by selecting the right lemons.

Prepared this way, the jars have a shelf life of 18 months to 2 years, and require no special attention. If you'd rather make orange juice, see this page

 

Directions for Making Canned Lemon Juice

Ingredients

• Lemons or oranges (see step 1)

Equipment

• Jar grabber (to pick up the hot jars)
• Lid lifter (I like the lid rack that holds 12 lids or you can pull them out one at a time with the lid-lifter that has a magnet from the almost-boiling water where you sanitize them. ($4 at mall kitchen stores and local "big box" stores, but it's usually cheaper online from our affiliates)t)
• Jar funnel ($4 at mall kitchen stores and local "big box" stores, but it's usually cheaper online from our affiliates)t)
• At least 1 large pot (at least 8-quart size or larger)
• Large spoons and ladles,
• Canning jars (often called Ball jars, Mason jars or Kerr jars) (Publix, Kroger, other grocery stores and some "big box" stores carry them - now about $12 per dozen quart jars (up 50% in 2 years!) including the lids and rings)
• Sieve:
  • a simple metal or plastic sieve. 
  • colander
• Filters - if you want filtered juice
  • jelly bag
  • cheesecloth
  • coffee filters
• 1 water bath canner (a huge pot with a lifting rack to sanitize the jars of lemon juice after filling (about $30 to $35 at mall kitchen stores and local "big box" stores, but it's usually cheaper online from our affiliates) You CAN use a large pot instead, but the canners are deeper, and have a rack top make lifting the jars out easier. If you plan on canning every year, they're worth the investment.

Recipe and Directions

Step 1 - Selecting the lemons

The most important step!   You should choose the best lemons you can get and make far better lemon juice.  Don't get me wrong, it is fine to use small lemons and less attractive varieties, as long as they are firm and unspoiled!

Step 2 - How many lemons and where to get them

You can pick your own, or buy them at the grocery store.  But for large quantities, you will find that real* farmer's markets, like the Farmer's Market in Forest Park, Georgia have them at the best prices.  In 2004, they were available from late September at $11 to $16 per bushel. 2005 prices have been in the $14 to $20 range at the real farmer's markets, like the Atlanta-Forest park Georgia State Farmer's Market and orchards in the southeast of the U.S.

You will get about 12 to 20 quarts of lemon juice per bushel of lemons.  Count on 15 or 16  quarts per bushel.

* - not the cutesy, fake farmer's markets that are just warehouse grocery stores that call themselves farmer's markets.

Step 3 - Wash the jars and lids

Now's a good time to get the jars ready, so you won't be rushed later. The dishwasher is fine for the jars; especially if it has a "sanitize" cycle, the water bath processing will sanitize them as well as the contents! If you don't have a dishwasher with a sanitize cycle, you can wash the containers in hot, soapy water and rinse, then sanitize the jars by boiling them 10 minutes, and keep the jars in hot water until they are used. Leave the jars in the dishwasher on "heated dry" until you are ready to use them. Keeping them hot will prevent the jars from breaking when you fill them with the hot lemon juice.

Put the lids into a pan of hot, but not quite boiling water (that's what the manufacturer's recommend) for 10 minutes, and use the magnetic "lid lifter wand" to pull them out.

Step 4 -Wash and peel the lemons or oranges!

I'm sure you can figure out how to wash the fruit in plain cold water. If you have a juicer or squeezer, it obviously makes it much easier.  If you don't have a juicer, don't fret, just peel the fruit (as shown in the photo), then chop or crush the fruit with a potato masher and continue to the next step.

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Step 5 - Briefly, quickly cook the lemons / oranges

Pretty simple put about 2 inches of water (I used filtered tap water) on the bottom of a huge, thick-bottomed pot. Put the lid on, and the heat on high.  When it gets really going, turn it off - you only want to release the juice from the pulp.. Obviously, if you used a juicer, you can skip this step and step 6.

Hardware stores sell a fruit steamer.  I haven't used one yet, but I hear they work well.

Step 6 - Sieve the cooked lemons

Now you want to separate the liquid from the pulp, skins, seeds, stems, etc.  There are quite a variety of ways to filter the lemons. 

Unfiltered juice:

• I like a natural lemon juice, with the natural cloudiness of the fruit particles in it, so I just plop the cooked lemons into a large metal or plastic sieve or colander.
• You can also refrigerate the juice for 24 to 48 hours and then decant it (without mixing, carefully pour off clear liquid and discard sediment).

Filtered juice:

• A better way if you want filtered lemon juice is just to line your sieve or colander with  several layers of cheese cloth and let the juice drip through.  It could take an hour..
• If you want really clear lemon juice (but most people prefer "natural" style with some solids) you can strain the juice through a paper coffee filter place inside a sieve or colander.
• If you want more filtered lemon juice, use a jelly bag. Just pour hot prepared fruit pulp into a jelly bag and let it drip.  . Do not squeeze the bag.! In my experience this method takes forever.

Note: One of the easiest ways to extract juice is by using a steam juicer available at many hardware and variety stores. If you plan on making a lot of juice or doing this every year, it may be worth buying one. This unique piece of equipment allows you to conveniently extract juice by steaming the fruit which is held in a retaining basket. The juice drops into a reservoir which has a tube outlet for removal. Follow manufacturer's instructions for using steam juicer.

If your goal is to make lemon juice, you will still have a lot of lemon pulp left, so I'd recommend you make lemon curd from it (see this page)

Step 7 - Heat the lemon juice

Put the lemon juice into a large pot.

The lemon juice does not need any further cooking; just get it heated to a low simmering boil and keep it hot until you get enough made to fill the jars you will put into the canner (Canners hold seven jars at once, whether they are quart or pint size)

Step 8 - Fill the jars and process them in the water bath

Fill them to within 1/4-inch of the top, wipe any spilled lemon juice of the top, seat the lid and tighten the ring around them.  Put them in the canner and keep them cover with at least 1 or 2 inches of water and boiling. if you are at sea level (up to 1,000 ft) boil pint  or quart jars for 5 minutes and half gallon jars for 10 min. This assumes you kept the juice hit until you filled the jars. If you are at an altitude of 1,000 feet or more, see the chart below

Step 9 - Remove and cool the jars - Done

Lift the jars out of the water and let them cool without touching or bumping them in a draft-free place (usually takes overnight)  You can then remove the rings if you like, but if you leave them on, at least loosen them quite a bit, so they don't rust in place due to trapped moisture. Once the jars are cool, you can check that they are sealed verifying that the lid has been sucked down. Just press in the center, gently, with your finger. If it pops up and down (often making a popping sound), it is not sealed. If you put the jar in the refrigerator right away, you can still use it. Some people replace the lid and reprocess the jar, then that's a bit iffy. If you heat the contents back up, re-jar them (with a new lid) and the full time in the canner, it's usually ok.

 

 

 

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Other Equipment:

From left to right:

1. Jar lifting tongs to pick up hot jars
2. Lid lifter - to remove lids from the pot of boiling water (sterilizing )
3. Lids- disposable - you may only use them once
4. Ring - holds the lids on the jar until after the jars cool - then you remove them, save them and reuse them
5. Canning Jar funnel - to fill the jars

 

 

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