I will let the experts talk about safety and technical issues but I am also putting up peaches as we speak. I got a few lugs of delicious peaches, very juicy and sweet on their own. I know most people don't have freezer space to spare but I will cast my vote for freezing. In the past few years I canned both in water and apple juice. I found the apple juice to be much superior as far as taste goes. I just prefer the freezer because of the way we use them. Of course, my kids are older and into smoothies and such. What I did this time was peel (used a boiling bath for a few seconds, literally no waste) then dunk into ice water. I cut these up, sprinkling fruit fresh (or lemon juice, vit c tabs, etc) and tossed. I packed them into snack bags which I then packaged in a gallon freezer bag. That way I can have a frozen treat or the fixins for a smoothie. I love the way the fruit fresh brings out a "tang" in the really sweet peaches. Just an idea and again noting that freezer space may be limited. Last year I also made up peach sauce which I canned. People made fun of me at work for my "baby food," LOL, but I loved it. They don't say anything about apple sauce, right? Good luck! Lori

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I think tapioca makes a pie yukky...I use cornstarch for cherry pie but flour for apple and bl7ueberry...guess I just like the taste flour gives....or am in a habit!LOL! If you use either, mix it with a little of the sugar before sprinkling over the apples so it doesn't get in lumps. Depending on how juicy the apples...about 1 T cornstarch or 3 T flour. Linda c

Macerate your fruit and cook down the juices to a thick syrup BEFORE BAKING. Just mix all the sugar and anything else together with the fruit and let it sit (in the fridge) for a couple of hours (I do it up to 24 hours with a firm fruit such as apple) and then drain off the juice, set the fruit aside, and reduce the juice until it is as thick as honey. Put the fruit in the pie as usual and add the reduced-to-syrup juice back in and bake as usual. When making an apple pie, I also par-cook the apples. I've done apple pie that way for almost 50 years - it was taught me by an aunt after repeated goopy apple pie failures. Recently I discovered there is science behind this method (parcooking the apples) - it "sets" the apple so it won't get much softer in the pie. This is why I have for decades been able to make great apple pie using MacIntosh apples, which according to common knowledge are supposed to reduce to applesauce in a pie. They don't if you parcook them. They do get a little softer than most other varieties when cooked in a pie, but not unacceptably or even noticeably so unless you are doing a side-by-side comparison. Anyway. I wouldn't parcook the berries as I think they may be too soft to be treated that way, but do drain off and reserve the juices and reduce it to a syrup. You should need little or no thickener. As for grinding up tapioca pearls, you can do that - but I would use a spice grinder or coffee grinder (which of course has never seen a bean) - making sure the grinder is thoroughly cleaned out (run some rice through it several times and wipe out well to clean out any spice residue). A food processor just won't do a good job. As someone else mentioned, you can find tapioca flour in an Asian grocery, but it could have any of several names: Tapioca flour Tapioca starch Cassava flour Cassava starch Yucca flour Yucca starch Seems to me there is another additional possible name which I am forgetting, but hopefully that will cover your bases. They are all exactly the same thing. I bet you could have found arrowroot powder somewhere also, that is often used as a thickener. Oh, and I just looked it up - Tapioca/yucca/cassava starch/flour is sometimes labeled as "arrowroot" even though it isn't from the arrowroot plant. SO that's probably the 4th possible name I was trying to remember.