Oui Jars for Canning Jelly

When jelly is canned using wax, several very thin layers of hot wax are poured over the cooling jelly. As the first thin layers cools, it pulls away from the jelly jar edges.
when you pour the second thin layer, you sort of rotate the high and low sides of the jar so that the wax goes into the empty edges. Layer after layer is poured so as to assure sealing the wax to the edge of the jar. Pouring a thicker layer just wastes wax and may not seal the jar.

This is not an approved method of canning or sealing jelly. However, it worked for years as the only method for some people. I hear it is not for long-term canning. But, I do know this was used for jelly for storage.This method would work for the Oui jars if you are canning jelly to give for gifts. This is one time you want firm jelly. You cannot can failed jelly and call it ice cream topping with wax on top.

WM sells the 1 lb, box of Gulf Wax for $3.12 (I checked), but I bought my Gulf Wax blocks for a quarter for one pound at yard sales. If you think it is dusty, just scrape the outside with a knife until you get to "new" wax,  You only need something to melt the wax in. I would put a cup in a pan of water to avoid melting wax in a pot and having it pop and catch on fire.

For the life of me, I cannot get a Oui jar photo to put on the blog that does not go right over the Gulf Wax photo. It must be a blog thing because  nothing works.

Gulf Wax is another memory from my early childhood. My family received jars of jelly sealed with wax. By rinsing the jelly covered wax, the wax can be reused to seal more jelly. When I first married, a woman gave me a regular glass of jelly sealed with wax.

Like I said, this is not an approved method. If you are just making jelly to give for Christmas, in my opinion this will be fine for a few months. I might even eat the jelly after many months.

Other repurposing of Oui jars is available if you do not want to can jelly.

Have you ever seen/used jelly sealed with wax? Have you ever sealed jelly with wax?

Canning, Candy Canes, Car

Candy canes always get soft and sticky. Around June I try to get rid of candy not eaten around here. Even kids don't like candy canes once it gets icky. When I had lots of company, I kept bowls of ribbon candy and other hard candy out at Christmas for visitors to eat. It is too sugary for me, so it sits for months in the covered candy dishes.  Now, I don't have a lot of company, so there are never any candy dishes around. However, there are candy canes.

Using a quart jar, I put 20 candy canes inside, some crook up, some crook down, still in the cellophane. That left 4 candy canes. After I took off the cellophane  those last four and broke them into 1.5" pieces, I had only half-filled a half-pint jar. This way, I can use the canes in recipes or share with friends or children before the are icky. Or, I can have a tiny piece once in a while.

The car won't run. The mechanic won't come back. Well, he is not answering the phone. Another friend insists I use his shade-tree mechanic friend. I told the guy I cannot pay his friend or buy parts. He insists I wait until I have money so his friend can do the work. I am furious. I only want this guy friend to remove boxes from my car, not find a mechanic. Calling a tow truck is the only thing I want now. The guy STILL insists I use his friend! I can only borrow another friend's cc to pay for this whole thing! It's like he goes deaf when I say that.

What I did was to talk to the owner of the shop where I will take my car. He was very enthusiastic about the Sea Foam, explaining in detail what the mechanic in my yard said about cleaning the engine.

Anecdote of the Jar--on a bear's head?

First, a jar-related, Tennessee image and poem. Then onto canning jar preparations.
Was this what Wallace Stevens meant?



Anecdote of the Jar

by Wallace Stevens

I placed a jar in Tennessee,
And round it was, upon a hill.
It made the slovenly wilderness
Surround that hill.

The wilderness rose up to it,
And sprawled around, no longer wild.
The jar was round upon the ground
And tall and of a port in air.

It took dominion everywhere.
The jar was gray and bare.
It did not give of bird or bush,
Like nothing else in Tennessee.

That bear certainly is on a hill in Tennessee. I wonder what Wallace Stevens thinks. Sorry, but I am an English major.

Now, for canning jars and equipment
You know you have to do this, so now is the time to get things out and in place if not washed and sterilized. Do you have enough rings? Should you buy more flats?   Do you know where the jar tongs are?

Your turn
Are your jars ready? Does a photo ever remind you of a familiar poem? Or, am I just someone who has taken one too many English courses? LOL