Canning and preservation - can-along!

Food & Drink Discussion and Questions
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There are plenty of canning-related threads on LC, but not a discusssion thread, so I thought I’d start one.

I grew up eating a lot of home-grown food, so I watched the women in my family preserve a lot, but that’s a long time ago. No one has been preservering in my family for 20 years. My family used to water bath can only, as pressure canning is virtually unknown in Europe. Recently I bought a pressure canner from a shop that imports them from the US.

We are members of a starting food coop, so from next year I expect to eat a lot more homegrown food. We’ll want to preserve some of that food, too, so this year it’s on my goal list to experiment with canning a bit more.

I’d love to talk to others here who are also into canning, considering how many recipes there are on LC, I’m sure I’m not the only one who is interested in it: Topics tagged canning !

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And a little bit more about what kind of things I’m thinking of canning:

I’m particularly interested in “meal in a jar” type of recipes, I haven’t found a lot of them yet. Due to chronic illness, sometimes I can get super tired, and my fatigue doesn’t always come when I expect it, so I’m not always prepared for it. We try to eat fresh food, but on those days I’m suddenly too tired to prepare it. We only have a very small freezer so not much space to freeze meals. This is why I always have an emergency stash of stuff like canned soups in the pantry, but that kind of food is obviously not really healthy. I’d like to replace them with home canned versions.

I’m also a bit worried about the situation in the world right now. I’m not a real “prepper” but I’m interested in being a bit more prepared for supply chain issues, being without power temporarily etc.

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My first question here by the way - it’s a bit hard to find pressure canning recipes in my country. The shop I bought the canner from has a limited amount of recipes available. The Ball book comes highly recommended, does anyone own it? Is it as good as the Internet says? It’s fairly expensive here (45 euro / 50+ USD). If it’s a book you’re going to use constantly for years it’s an investment but it’s a waste to let it sit on the shelf. I’ve not been able to find it used yet.

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This site has a lot of information on pressure cooker canning.

Info on canning

I like that you can pick the item you want to can and it gives pretty detailed information.

My dad did a lot of canning, especially tomatoes, but he never mastered canning corn. Apparently, canning acidic foods is pretty easy and safe. We had a pressure cooker when I was growing up so I do remember him canning pork barbecue and lots of beans.

I gave away all of my canning supplies and jars when I moved. After we moved in, the woman next door brought us a jar of her canned applesauce…it was so delicious that I sort of regret that decision now.

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Tomatoes are surprisingly not acidic enough to can without additional acid!
I am on the lookout for a pressure canner. I’ve done lots of traditional water-bath canning & dehydrating as well as fermenting & really want to try salting & smoking methods (maybe this topic could be about more types of food preservation?)

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I am pretty sure he added some citric acid to a lot of things he canned. I found bags of the stuff when we helped my mom clear out her kitchen.

I gave both of my dehydrators away as well. Food preservation is a lot of work, but having turkey jerky was a nice perk!

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It’s called canning and preservation, so I would definitely love to hear more about other methods than water bath / pressure canning. I have no personal experience with salting or smoking and only a little dehydrating or fermenting experience.

@AIMR my family used to can a ton of applesauce, but I always make it fresh now. You can easily make small portions and apples are cheap year round.

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I’m a big fan of food preservation. I do water bath canning, pressure canning, dehydrating, fermenting, freezing, and smoking. My favorite reference books are:
The Beginner’s Guide to Preserving Food at Home by Janet Chadwick
A Guide to Canning, Freezing, Curing & Smoking Meat, Fish & Game by Wilbur Eastman
And to a lesser degree
The Urban Homestead by Kelly Coyne and Erik Knutzen

I do a lot of fruit related things and now fish related. I do veggies sometimes, but I can’t grow a plant to save my life, so I’m not someone with a garden to keep up with. But totally down to chat!

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