Eight Ideas for Preserving Cherries

Do you have extra cherries and don't know what to do with them? Try some of these delicious ideas.

You can make plain canned cherries much like you would can peaches or pears, but I have to admit that they are not our favorite fruit when canned plain. If, like us, you are looking for new ways to preserve your cherries, try some of the delicious ideas below. 

Canning

Cherry Barbecue Sauce

One of our favorite ways to use sweet cherries is cherry barbecue sauce. We are sauce afficionados at our house. One year when we were blessed with a large amount of cherries, but no tomatoes, we decided to try this recipe. It is a bit different, of course, than traditional barbecue sauce, but it is really flavorful. You can find the recipe on our website here: https://www.preppedliving.com/home/projects-recipes/recipes/cherry-bbq-sauce

Cherry Pie Filling

This is our favorite project to do with tart pie cherries. They look so beautiful in the jars and make pie baking so easy. One quart jar makes a 9 inch pie. You can use the pie filling for cherry crisp or cherry cobbler as well. If making a 9x13 baking dish of cobbler or crisp, use two quart jars of pie filling. Here is a recipe I found online for canned cherry pie filling: https://melissaknorris.com/cherry-pie-filling-recipe-canning-instructions/

Cherry Butter

One of the ladies on our local Signal group recommended this recipe for cherry butter. It looks so good! She said it came out amazing: https://creativecanning.com/cherry-butter/

Dehydrating/Drying

Dried Cherries

Dried cherries are a nice, sweet treat any time of year. These can be enjoyed as-is, added to trail mix, or cut into smaller pieces and used like raisins in your favorite recipes.

To dry cherries, wash and pit the cherries. You can cut them in halves or quarters. Pat dry. Dry in a dehydrator at 135 degrees for 12-36 hours, depending on the size of your cherries or cherry pieces. When finished, the texture should resemble a raisin - pliable and tacky, but not wet. Alternatively, you can dry them in the oven at 200 degrees for approximately six hours (whole, pitted cherries). Be sure to keep an eye on the cherries and check them frequently to ensure they do not overdry, beoming hard and crunchy. If you are drying pieces, you will want to dry them for much less time and keep an eye on them so they don’t over bake.

Once dried, allow the cherries to cool and store in an airtight container for six to twelve months. We often store our extra dried fruits in the freezer. I know this is not necessary, but it extends their longevity and keeps them from molding should there be one or two that did not dry enough.

Freezing

Frozen Cherries

To freeze cherries, wash them, dry them, remove the pits and freeze whole or pit them and cut in half or into pieces. You can do this with pie cherries and sweet cherries. Frozen cherries are great to use in both smoothies and recipes. While you can make pie filling out of frozen cherries, you can also simply freeze the pie filling mix itself (see below) to save time later.

Frozen Cherry Pie Filling

One of our favorite people taught us that you can mix up the pie filling ingredients, freeze it, put it in your crust in its frozen state, and bake it. To keep from having to thaw it, pour your favorite cherry pie mix in a freezer bag, set the bag in the pie pan in which you plan to bake it, and freeze it overnight. Remove the bag from the pan and store the bagged filling in the freezer. When ready to make your pie, place your crust in the pan, remove the pre-formed, still-frozen filling from the bag, place it in your crust, and bake according to your recipe directions. There is no need to thaw the filling before baking!

Preserving in Alcohol

Bourbon Cherries 

Bourbon soaked cherries are a popular garnish to some of our favorite cocktails. I found a few recipes we would like to try:

https://inspiredbycharm.com/bourbon-cherries/ This simple recipe has only three ingredients: bourbon, cherries, and sugar.

https://glamorosicooks.com/recipe/bourbon-soaked-cherries-recipe/ This recipe has a bit of a twist with added orange juice and vanilla.

Rum-soaked Cherries

We made a batch of these simply by soaking pitted cherries in spiced rum. We later experimented with adding a bit of sugar. I enjoy sipping the cherry infused rum on occasion. We have also used the rum-soaked cherries and the cherry infused rum in our sangria. It adds such great flavor to this summertime drink! Below are a couple of rum-soaked cherry recipes to try:

https://www.cookingwithnonna.com/italian-cuisine/cherries-in-rum.html This is is similar to what we tried the first time around.

https://www.thefrugalfoodiemama.com/2017/07/vanilla-spiced-rum-soaked-cherries.html This recipe calls for brown sugar and vanilla – yum!