Canning Basics

Hello and happy Monday (or happy whatever day it is you happen to be reading this)!

I probably should have started with this blog before the others, but better late than never, right?

Today we’re going to explore some canning basics – including different canning methods, jar sizes and their uses, tools you’ll need to get started canning, and more.

Check out the video I made on canning basics 

 

We’ll start with some common tools you’ll need. 

• A pressure canner or large pot – to actually process the jars to create the vacuum seal.
• A jar lifter – for putting jars into and taking them from hot water.
• A jar wrench – for tightening the rim on your jars when needed.
• Canning funnel – this is a funnel specifically designed with a wider mouth for pouring food into canning jars.
• A sieve or cheesecloth – for straining food.
• And lots of jars

 

Other tools you might need are:

• A lid lifter – this is a magnet on the end of a long plastic handle to aid in taking your lids out of the boiling water used to sterilize them.
• A thin plastic spatula or non-metal chopstick – for helping to remove bubbles from your filled jars.
• A mill – this is a tool used for processing your food into a smooth consistency.

I suggest having both a pressure canner and a large pot, since pressure canners are multi-functional and can be used for both pressure canning and processing your food in a water bath. By having both a pressure canner and regular pot, you can have several batches of canning processing at once.

 

The purpose of canning

Canning is a method of food preservation by sealing food in a glass jar with a vacuum seal.

This can be achieved two ways; by pressure canning the jars, or by processing the jars in a water bath.

A water bath creates the vacuum seal by forcing the food in the jar to expand while the water is boiling, and the seal is completed while the jars are cooling.

Pressure canning works very similarly, by forcing the food to expand while the water is boiling and completing the seal while the jars are cooling, but also uses the additional pressure created by trapping steam inside the pot to create the strong vacuum seal that will protect the food from bacteria.

You can use the pressure canning method for just about any canning recipe you want, just be sure to follow the instructions closely. There are a few things that require pressure canning processing vs processing in a water bath. Anything that has a low acidity level will need to be pressure canned to ensure that they are properly sealed and safe to store in a pantry. This includes many vegetables (unless they are pickled), and any recipes with meats, poultry, or fish in them.

Water bath processing is a perfectly safe method of canning:

• Most tomatoes
• Pickled vegetables
• Jams and jellies
• Most fruits and fruit juices
• Salsas
• As well as a few more things

Whatever recipe you are using should indicate which processing method you will need to safely be able to store your canned food.

 

The parts of the jar and their purpose

Firstly, is the jar itself. This will hold the food you plan to can. You’ll want to inspect your jars for any cracks, internally or externally, and nicks in the rim before use. Cracks are weak points that will be put under stress in the heating and cooling process and will be the first parts to fail and break, making the food unusable.

Nicks in the rims of the jar will not allow a proper vacuum seal and could cause your food to spoil or bacteria to get into the jar and cause illness.

There are two mouth types available for jars; wide mouth and regular mouth. 

Wide mouth jars are great if you want to store your canned food in the freezer, as they are made with thicker glass, and have a straight neck.

Regular mouth jars should not be used for storing food in the freezer, as there will be additional pressure on the neck (the narrower bit at the top of the jar) as the food inside freezes. This pressure can put stress on the jar and cause it to crack and break, making it unsafe to consume the food stored inside.

Both wide mouth and regular mouth jars can be used to canning food to store in the pantry, whichever you use is up to your personal preference. 

Jars also come in a variety of sizes, with some of the most easily found being 4 ounce jars, 8 ounce jars, 12 ounce jars, pint sized, and quart sized. You can also purchase jars in half gallons and full gallons.

Next is the lid. This seals the food inside the jar and protects it from bacteria. Most jars you purchase at the store will come with lids and rims on them already. Lids and rims can also be purchased separately. Generally, these lids will be single-use only. This means that after you have used them to can once, they are no longer safe to use to can something else in the future and should be discarded.

There are multi-use lids that you can purchase, one brand that I have found is Tattler. According to the link, they’re dishwasher safe, and can be used indefinitely in both canning methods.

The final piece of the jar is the rim. The rim’s only purpose is to hold the lid in place while the jar is processing in the pot. Once the seal is complete, the rim can be removed and used on another jar. Unlike the lids, your rims are usable forever, unless they are damaged.

 

Testing your seal is safe

The whole point of canning is to preserve your food to store and eat at a later date, so you want to make sure the vacuum seals on your jars are good and your jars can be stored in the pantry or cupboard.

After you pull your jars out of either the water bath or the pressure canner, you should hear a ‘pop’ sound as they are cooling. This is a sure sign that the seal is good. But for the times you can’t verify that there was a pop, there are a couple other options to check the seal.

If the seal is good, when you press gently in the middle of the lid with a finger, there should be no movement or flex in the lid. If the lid pops up and down in the middle, the seal is bad.

You can also test the seal by lifting the jar by the lid. If it doesn’t move, then the seal is good.

So, what do you do if the jar didn’t seal?

You don’t want to try processing the jar again. Like I mentioned earlier, most lids are single use only, so if they didn’t seal the first time around, it isn’t safe to try to can with that lid again.

A couple options you have to preserve that food is to move it to another container and store it in the freezer, or to store the food in the original jar in the fridge and use the contents as soon as possible.

 

 

 

That’s a good place to start for canning, please let me know if you like this post.

I hope you all have a freaking awesome rest of your week, until next time!

 

-Alyx

Making and Canning Chicken Soup

If you’re anything like me, you’ll prioritize ease when it comes to making dinner. I love chicken soup, and love even more that I can make a big batch to can and use later. This frees up precious space in the freezer, and is an easy meal to dump into the pot on a cold day. 

This is the second time ever using my pressure canner AS a pressure canner, and since I’m excited, let’s jump into it.

This is a LOOOOOONG process. I took me close to 6 hours from start to finish, so it’s best to do this when you have an afternoon or morning you can block out.

Be sure to check out the video I made for this recipe on my YouTube

 

Ingredients:

 

• 2 chicken carcasses - I use the leftover meat, bones, and skin off whole roast chickens that I save in the freezer. You can also use one full uncooked chicken for this recipe.
  
• 5-6 carrots, chopped
• 1 whole onion, chopped
• 3 celery stalks, chopped
• Salt, to taste

 

Step One

Put your chicken in a 12-quart pot and add water until the pot is roughly ¾ full.

 

Step Two

Next, we’re going to chop and add our veggies.

How small you chop them is up to you, I normally cut them all pretty well, since I like to save the meat and vegetables to keep in the soup. If I were just saving the broth, I wouldn’t bother cutting them any smaller than into a couple inch chunks.

 

Step Three

Bring your pot to a rolling boil. Once it’s boiling, drop the heat until it stays at a consistent simmer, and leave it alone for a couple hours to cook down.

I generally leave it for 3 hours, or until the water has cooked down to around the half-way mark on the pot.

Once it’s cooked down as far as you want it, you can taste the broth and add salt (or any other seasonings) to your liking.

 

Step Four

Place a strainer in a large bowl and carefully pour the pot into the strainer. This will help you separate the broth from the solids.

 

Step Five

Here comes the canning section!

Last time I made this recipe, it perfectly filled four quart-sized jars, so I split the broth evenly amongst those four jars.   

If you are just looking at saving the broth, it would fill two quart jars and one pint.

(Optional)

I like to keep the meat and veggies in the soup, so I endure the painstaking process of sorting every little bit to make sure I’m not accidentally adding any bone back into the broth. Like I mentioned earlier, with the recipe above, I got four quarts with the broth and solids.

Fill your jars so there is an inch of headspace.

Headspace is the distance from the top of the stuff in the jar to the rim of the jar.

 

Step Six

Wipe down the tops of the jars with a damp paper towel or cloth, place your lids, and screw on the rims finger-tight.

Set them into your pressure canner so none of the jars are touching.

Add water until there is at least two inches of water over the top of the jars.

Secure and lock the lid of your pressure canner, turn on the heat, and let the steam build up.

Once steam is coming out the spout, place your 10lb weight on top, and adjust your heat to keep the pressure at 10lbs.

With my canner, I know the lid is locked with a red button on the side pops up. Once that button falls back down I know that the pressure has returned to zero, or is close to zero. Each pressure canner is a little different, so be sure to check the instructions with yours.

 

Step Seven

The jars need to process for 90 minutes, so you can work on other things while this is going. If your canner is finicky, be sure to stay within eye-sight to adjust the temperature as needed.

At the end of the 90 minutes, turn off the heat and let the pressure return to zero. This can take upwards of an hour (or longer), so you’ve got more time to focus on other things again.

Take of that canning weight, make sure your lid is no longer locked, and carefully remove the lid facing away from you so you don’t run the risk of any leftover steam hitting you in the face.

 

Step Eight

Now we can remove our jars! Use a jar lifter (yeah, that’s what those funny looking tongs are called) and carefully pull them out of the water and set them on a flat surface to cool.

As they cool, you should hear a POP! This means the seal is good and the jars can be stored in your cupboard or pantry. If any of the lids do not pop you’ll need to store them in the fridge and use them sooner rather than later. You can test the seal by gently pressing on the middle of the lids. If they do not flex, that means they're sealed. If they do flex, it didn't seal fully.

 

Please let me know if you try my recipe and what you think of it, I’d love to hear from you.

Thank you for joining me, hopefully we’ll get to try some more exciting recipes and other projects in the future.

Hope you all have a freaking awesome rest of your week, and I’ll catch you next time!

 

-Alyx

Canning Green Beans

I don’t know about any of you, but the thought of using a pressure canner has been something that stressed me out to think about for a long time.

Recently I decided to tackle it head on and try my hand at canning green beans. Because green beans are less acidic than canning items like jams and tomato sauce, to ensure it has a full seal and is safe to store and eat later, you need to use a pressure canner.

I’ve skipped the whole section of cleaning and preparing the beans, as well as how to prep your jars and lids, since I plan on going over both those processes in the future.

So, let's jump right into the canning!

Check out the full process in my YouTube video 

 

Step 1

Before we actually do anything with our jars, we’re going to set up the pressure canner so it’s ready to go, since the water heating up takes the longest amount of time.

We want there to be enough water in the pot to sit 2 inches over the jars, but we can get this fully set up later when our jars are prepped and ready to go.

The recipe that I was following called for 2 quarts of water in the pot. After adding this, I ended up needing 24 additional cups of water to fully cover my 7 jars. I set the heat on medium to start the heating process.

 

Step 2

Now we’re going to fill our jars. Doesn’t matter how well you pack them, there will be gaps between the beans, and that’s perfectly fine!

I normally cover the top of the jar with my hand and give them a good shake to settle the beans as much as I can before adding anything else.

I had enough to perfectly fill 7 jars.

 

Step 3

During this section, we’re going to get a pot of water on the stove and heating up to an almost boil.

Next, we’re going to add salt to our jars. This step is optional, but I personally think it helps with the flavor.

Regular table salt is perfectly fine to use in canning, but the additives in it will cause your water to look cloudy, which is why most recipes call for purer forms of salt or canning salt. Again, regular table salt is safe, it just won’t look as beautiful and Instagram perfect.

For pint jars, you’re going to want to use a ½ tsp, if you are canning in quart jars you’ll want to use a full tsp.

 

Step 4

Take your hot water and carefully pour into the jars over your beans and salt. You want to leave an inch of headspace. Headspace is the distance from the rim of the jar to the top of the contents of the jar.

 

Step 5

Using a narrow spatula or chopstick, gently move the contents of the jar around to help release the air bubbles trapped in the beans. Another method you can do is to very gently tap the jars on a soft surface, like a folded towel.

Most likely you’ll need to add more of that hot water to make sure your headspace is at the 1 inch mark again.

 

Step 6

We want to make sure our lids have a clean seal so bacteria don’t have a chance to get in and grow, so we’re going to wipe around the rim of the jar with a clean, damp towel.

Now we can set the lids on top and screw on the rims so they’re finger tight.

 

Step 7

Now we add the jars to the water! They need to sit flat, and none of them should touch, so they don’t knock against each other and crack or break. My pressure canner easily fits 7 pint jars in one batch.

Again, double check that the surface of the water is at least 2 inches above the tops of the jars. This ensures that the water won’t boil down past the tops of the jars and cause issues in the canning process.

Put the pressure canner lid on and lock it into place. My canner doesn’t lock until pressure actually builds up in the pot.

Wait until steam starts coming from the spout, we’re going to pop on our 10 lb canning weight onto it. Once your pot has sealed, set a timer for 20 minutes, and let it boil away. Like I mentioned before, my pot doesn’t actually lock until pressure has built up in the pot, so once I’ve set on my weight, I went ahead and started my timer.

Keep a close eye to the weight to make sure it stays pretty close to 10 lbs, you can easily do this by adjusting your heat. Depending on your canner’s age, you might not even have to touch the temp at all.

 

Step 8

Once your alarm goes off, turn off the heat and let the pressure gage return to zero. With mine, there is no gage, just the button on the side that indicates whether it’s fully sealed or not. Once that lock drops down, I knew that the pressure was back to zero and I was able to take the lid off.

This is one of the more dangerous sections, so be careful! Use hot mitts to remove the canning weight and remove the lid. Always make sure to open it away from your face so any excess steam doesn’t burn you!

 

Step 9

The best way to take your jars out is using a jar lifter.

Set your jars on a wire cooling rack, clean counter space, or a towel laid out flat. I felt adventurous and used a thick wooden cutting board.

 

Step 10

This is the final step!

Your jars need to cool, and as they’re cooling you should hear the lids popping. This is your indicator that the seal was successful and your jars can be stored.

Any jars that don’t pop, you’ll be able to press the middle of the lid up and down to test this, will need to be refrigerated and eaten sooner rather than later.

 

 

 

And look at your beautiful canned beans!

Thank you for joining for this learning experience, hopefully we’ll get to try some more exciting recipes in the future.

Hope you all have a freaking awesome rest of your week, and I’ll catch you next time!

 

-Alyx