Canning Fruit Juices

Fruits and berries, especially when hand picked or home-grown, are one of the joys of summer and fall. Almost every fruit you can grow contains delicious juices, and juicing the fruit can be a rewarding and fun way to use excess fruit or bruised and damaged specimens. While a fruit juicer adds many possibilities to using fruits, all you need to start is typically a container and the willingness to experiment.

Extracting Juice

The biggest hurdle in the process is typically deciding how you want to extract your juice. For instance, vegetables (tomatoes excluded) often juice best in a mechanical juicer like we see on infomercials. A juice press that extracts almost all the moisture is the best solution of course, but most of us don’t have one of those.

Barring that, you can typically get juice from almost anything by just blending it and draining the blended portion through a coffee filter. This yields a fresh tasting juice, but it also makes a lot of waste. Soft berries often don’t need more than a routine crushing to extract juice.

Some harder fruits, like apples, give off the most juice if slightly cooked. a quick boiling or baking until they become softer is all that is needed to make the juice drain out. Again, once they are ready, put the mash over a coffee filter to reduce waste, or use a fine mesh strainer for a darker, but more hearty, drink. Cooking your fruits can alter enzymes and flavors, so I only use this method when I know it is called for.

Some fruits just don’t juice. Try as I might, I’ve never gotten a good liquid from a banana. Dried fruits are also right out, but I’ve wondered if they might be rehydrated and boiled to give up their vitamins.

Storing Your Juice

Juice can be stored as is in the refrigerator for a few days. Keeping it cold will prevent the natural yeasts from fermenting the juice immediately. Still, being out of the fruit will mean that it will begin to oxidize. Colors will possibly change, and flavors might change too. Even if the color changes, it is probably still good if it still tastes okay and doesn’t have any alcohol or vinegar smell.

Long Term Preservation

If you want to keep your juice for a long time, or store it for the winter, you will need some jars. Canning equipment is generally cheap, and the high acid fruits don’t require extra care to prevent botulism. All you need to do is boil the jars and the juice inside them. The boiling kills off the yeasts that would turn your juice into wine if left to their own devices. The jars are sealed when hot and when they cool, the pasteurized juice will keep for months. It requires very little to get a perfect result.

As before, boiling can alter delicate flavors. Personally, I don’t like to can delicate berry flavors as juice, instead turning these into jams and jellies. Peach, apple, and grapes all make great juices though. Often, especially with apple juice, I’ll throw in to the juice an extra flavoring like fresh figs, berries, or another in season fruit, since apple juice tends to be easily “overwritten” by other juices that otherwise wouldn’t fill an entire jar.

Experimentation Is King

In juicing and storing your fruits, experimentation is king. You will likely find that many of your mixes are better than others, but never be afraid to experiment. Juices generally blend well, and you never know when a new juice will catch your fancy. Have fun and enjoy making your own juices.

Sources:

Pickyourown.org: Directions for Making Apple Juice

DiscountJuicers.com: The Best way to Store Freshly Made Juice