Making peach jelly from peelings

Last week Kim, a Blind Pig reader and a friend, posted about making peach jelly from peelings on Instagram. I asked her to share the recipe with me and she did.

Granny taught me to make apple jelly from apple peelings, but I had never thought about using peach peelings in the same way.

Miss Cindy brought us a basket of white peaches from the farmer’s market and I was already planning to make a pan of Peach Bars. After I read the recipe Kim sent I thought “This is going to work out perfect. I can save the peelings from the peaches I use to make the bars and make jelly with them.” And that is exactly what I did.

Frugal peach jelly recipe

I had to borrow a pack of sure jel from Granny to make the jelly. She asked what I was making and after I told her she said “You should just make peach preserves like I do. That jelly will have peach fuzz in it.” Before I could say anything Chatter said “No it wont’ Granny. Every time I eat a peach I eat the peeling too and it don’t taste fuzzy.”

Well Granny still didn’t think I should make the jelly, but I did and it is wonderful! The jelly has a real peach taste and since I used white peaches it is a pretty light orangey pink color.

Here is the recipe Kim sent me:

Peach Jelly

4 cups peach juice

1/2 tsp. Butter (optional)

1 package of pectin

5 1/2 cups sugar

Canning jars, bands, lids

Place peach skins and pits in pot and cover with water. Bring to a boil.

Once mixture is boiling, turn down to medium/low and let simmer for 10 minutes.

Let mixture cool slightly. Strain juice.

If you have less than 4 cups of juice you can add water to make up the difference needed, but don’t use more than 1 cup of water. If you have more than 4 cups of juice, you can double the recipe or freeze extra for later use.

Place juice, butter, and pectin in  pot on high heat and bring to a boil.

Add sugar all at once and stir well. Bring mixture to a full rolling boil and boil for one minute. Ladle jelly into hot jars and seal.

After I made the jelly I remembered reading that peach seeds can be poisonous. A quick google assured me that you’d have to ingest a whole heck of a lot of ground up peach seeds to be poisoned.  If you’d rather leave the peach seeds out of the juice process just to be on the safe side, I don’t think it will make any difference in the way the recipe turns out.

Tipper

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23 Comments

  1. Hi I’m new to the website. I can’t open the link to the recipe-is it not active anymore or just my ancient laptop? I can peaches every year and would love to try this.

  2. I learned to do from my Aunt Mamie Francis, she made the prettiest peach jelly. We lost our peach trees in Hurricane Irene. We replanted but havent really had a good harvest on the new trees. I keep hoping. We love peach anything

  3. Tipper,
    I’ve made peach preserves…but can’t remember making jelly…Mom made peach jelly and preserves as well…We always washed the “dickens” out of our peaches and rubbed dry with a good stiff hand towel…I dare say that there was a “inkling” of peach fuzz left on the peaches…

    I remember going to the large produce market in Knoxville when I was a kid. There were many local grocers were going thru picking out there produce for their stores. You actually drove in and around the vendors in your car it was that large…If you wanted to you could park on one end and walk but Dad would drive a little and watch out for the men that were buying bulk..If we got lucky we would get a nice bushel of peaches just after a grocer had purchased near all of them and the farmer only had a few bushels left so he was willing to practically give them away since he had sold most of his large truck full at once, My Dad had a keen eye out for the grocers who was buying, corn, tomatoes, cucumbers, melons, peaches and apples…I have heard him say to my mother, “Don’t get in such a rush to buy, wait till they make a big sale!” We used to come home in that old Packard loaded down in produce…I remember especially one time that there wasn’t room to put the bushel of peaches in the trunk…So Dad made us squootch together and sat that intoxicating peach bushel in the middle of us…We couldn’t stand it…Even after being warned not to eat the peaches because we would get fuzz all over us and it would itch us to death before we drove that thirty/forty minutes back home. Well, we got one each anyway rubbed them on our clothes and hands and took big bites…They were so good, warm and juicy…but I thought I would die before we got home and get a bath to get all that fuzz off my neck, arms and face…No air-conditioning in that old car back then…LOL
    Mom quit making peach jelly in her later years out of peach peelings as well as apple peelings…She said there was no way to wash all the pesticides off the peels…She had read so much about what they were spraying on the orchards she said she didn’t want to risk it….She may have been right about that back then…
    Thanks Tipper for the memory

  4. Sounds wonderful, and what a great use of what others would cast off too.
    Our Great Grandmother made the most wonderful Tomato Butter that had a light taste between apple and peach.
    Our Dad tried to make it from her recipe once, and his turned out dark and heavy like molasses, so he ended up using it in his BBQ sauce.
    I’d still love to know how Grandma did it though. She must’ve had to use a very very small flame on her burner, or maybe one of those old stove top heat defusers. Was wonderful on buttered bread.
    Prayers everyone’s having a super week, and a safe one too.
    God bless.
    RB
    <><

  5. Peeling Peaches on Grandma’s big porch in Robbinsville N. C. was a family affair. The truck came up from Georgia with bushel baskets of juicy fruit and everyone set to work. I remember as a kid Daddy & Grandpa would use the “Pocket Knife” which was sharpened just right to do the job. Grandma Polly used a “Paring Knife” from the kitchen. “Case Knives” were for spreading butter and jam on biscuits. They were never sharpened (honed.)
    A Mountain Boy Child usually had few toys. A Pocket knife (Boker) A fishing pole, usually cane, a “Dollar” watch, a wagon, a sled, maybe a bicycle when a teenager, hand made pull toys when younger, a sling shot, a home made bow & arrow.
    Back to Peaches. Grandma made Peach Butter from the peels which were thick from hand peeling with Pocket & Paring knives.
    Good times with family. I treasure the memories.

  6. Your peach jelly looks beautiful. As another reader said, I don’t much like jelly, but fruit butters are a cinch to make. Nothing went to waste with you jam – great idea! I make peach butter, plum butter, apricot butter and apple butter, cooking the fruit with the peels on. They then go through the food mill which strains out the peels. Cooking the fruit with those peels make a big difference in the taste. I don’t use the peels with my peach preserves with rum though – cook with the peels off because of the process of making the preserves.

  7. In Texas, the Fredericksburg area of the Hill Country is known for its peaches: and every year I get a few boxes and make freezer peach jam, peach cobblers, peach ice cream, and we enjoy the simple delight of fresh peaches – but not this year – – too much goin’ on this summer – – and now, more than ever, I regret not making the trek to Fredericksburg at the end of June – the ones in the stores just don’t do justice to the famed flavor of peaches! Guess I’ll have to order some from Appalachia!!!

  8. My name is Marilyn Lambert, I was listening to the songs that the Presley girls song up at Smokemont Church and I wanted to let you know that they have revival at that church starting tonight August 8, 2016 at 7pm. The revival will be all week. Then they have homecoming on Sunday. Everyone is welcome.
    They have revival every year the week before the 2nd Sunday in August.
    Would love to hear the girls sing.

  9. My mother used to make jelly from peach peelings and bruises all the time. I can’t remember whether she used the pits or not. I remember hearing that peach seeds would poison a pig. I suppose that got started when someone watched a pig eating peaches. They will spit out the seed because they can’t crunch it up. A peach seed has sharp points that could hurt them if swallowed whole. The pig can’t digest them so they could potentially do damage all the way through.
    Peach seeds do contain cyanide but it doesn’t leach out into the yummy part. Cherry, apricot, almond and even apple seeds do too.
    I normally don’t eat peaches with peel still on because I don’t like the fussy feeling in my mouth but if push came to shove I wouldn’t pass on a peach just because I couldn’t peel it.

  10. Tipper,
    That Peach Jelly sure is pretty sitting on your porch rail. I never even thought of using the peelings and seeds for jelly. It looks like the fuzz would bother me, although I can’t see any in the picture. You’re always coming up with new ideas…Ken

  11. I was always cautioned not to eat the peel of a peach. This had no scientific basis, but probably was an old wife’s tale. But, just to be on the safe side I just never did eat a peach unless peeled. Your jelly looks wonderful all lined up. You will be ready for winter.

  12. Save the peach seeds and sun dry them. They will split open. Take out the seed and eat like almonds. They taste nearly the same.
    I had forgotten about using the apple peels. If memory serves, one reason to use them was for the pectin in them that would make other fruits gel. Before Sure Gel this was an issue.
    Your peach jelly sure is pretty. Can you line up your jellies in a sunny window and take a picture. of the various colors? They would look like stained glass.
    Finally getting some rain here. It’s fall gardening time!!!!

  13. There’s a special treat. Never had peach jelly, just preserves. I wonder if anyone makes quince jelly anymore? We had two gnarly quince trees, but that was 40 years ago, and I haven’t seen one since.

  14. That looks great. My mom made peach jelly and it was on of my favorites. Put on a pan of hot biscuits and I’ll be right on over!

  15. I made blueberry Jam, my first excursion into canning. It has turned out beautifully. I have always prefered jam over jelly as it spreads easier and you don’t tear up the soft bread.
    Peach I didn’t think about and they are not readily available here right now. Maybe next year.

  16. Tipper–Although I don’t think Momma ever made peach jelly, she put up plenty of peach preserves and today’s post started out my Monday in warm, winsome fashion by evoking memories of her.
    A daughter of the Depression who knew all too well the importance of the adage “make do with what you’ve got,” Momma always bought damaged, bruised, or “throw away” peaches from the local fruit stand at a greatly reduced price. She thus got three-quarters of what undamaged ones would have produced for a quarter of the price. Just a matter of simple economics and she was such a faithful customer the fruit stand guy saved culls for her.
    Now you need to tell us how the peach bars came out. As for the jelly, I strongly suspect that come cold weather a dollop of it slathered on a cathead biscuit (and for those of you who might have doubts, Tipper can flat-out bake biscuits) would be nectar of the culinary gods.
    Jim Casada

  17. Tip, I can’t wait to taste the jar you gave me yesterday. White peaches are my favorite!
    I’ve made apple jelly from the peelings but never thought of using peach peelings. It is true to our heritage of using everything!

  18. I did that this year, too. We always made apple juice and then jelly from the peelings, but never peach. I suspect this is because we always canned freestone praches, and the peelings were pretty thin. This year, however, I canned cling stone peaches and just couldn’t bear to let that much “goodie” go to waste – so I made peach juice and jelly. I took a lot of photos and kept meaning to write a blog post on the “how-to” – but the garden started coming in like gangbusters and I never had time.
    Here is a link to the apple version, though.
    https://newmanvalley.wordpress.com/2016/06/14/canning-apple-sauce-and-making-apple-juice/
    I did do a facebook post, though.
    https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=199076607156779&id=179662699098170

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