Storing lemon juice
How would you go about canning store-bought lemon juice? I assume due to the acidity that Tattler lids would come in handy here. Or is it fine to just store it in the plastic bottles it comes in?
Donnie
Lowman, New York
You can easily re-can store-bought lemon juice but you can also just store it in the bottles it comes in. If you find that the larger bottles are more than you usually use in a month or so, you can certainly re-can it into smaller containers. To re-can it, simply heat the juice to 165° F. Don’t boil it. Ladle into hot half-pint or pint jars, leaving ½ inch of headspace. Process for 15 minutes in a boiling water bath canner. If you live at an altitude above 1,000 feet, consult your canning book for directions on increasing your processing time. — Jackie
Growing potatoes
I don’t know if you have answered this before but I have a couple questions about potato’s. First: if you pinch off the flowers will you get more or bigger potatoes? I am currently raising mine in tires.
Second: how do you make Potato Flour?
Dave
Kennewick, Washington
No, you won’t get more or larger potatoes by pinching off the flowers. To get more or bigger potatoes, be sure to hill your potatoes at least twice during the growing season, once when the plants are about eight inches tall and again when they grow another eight inches. Potatoes are formed along the lower stems of the plant — the more stems that are covered by soil, the more potatoes you’ll harvest. Because hilling also eliminates competing weeds, the potatoes get larger than if the plants are left unhilled. Hilling also keeps those potatoes well covered by soil so they don’t heave up and get exposed to the sun which turns them green. The green part should be cut off of potatoes before eating them as it is mildly toxic.
There are two ways to make potato flour. The first is most common. Peel your raw potatoes, then boil them and make “mashed potatoes” without adding butter or other ingredients. Then spoon them out onto fruit leather dehydrator trays about 1/4 inch thick. Dehydrate at about 125° F until crisp. Break into chunks and put into your blender and blend until powder-like. Pour through a sieve to remove any larger pieces. Re-blend the larger pieces. Store in an airtight container.
To make raw potato flour, grate peeled, raw potatoes and put in a bowl of ice water for several hours or overnight. Drain well and pat dry between two layers of kitchen towel. Lay out on regular dehydrator trays and dehydrate until crisp. Follow the rest of above directions.
Potato flour is useful in soups, as a thickener for gravies or stews, in many bread recipes, and in some gluten-free recipes. (Like many powdered dehydrated foods, it takes a LOT of potatoes to get a few cups of potato flour. A whole bushel of my onions dehydrated down to a full quart of onion powder!) — Jackie
