anybody know anything about canning?
Posted by nutdragon on Nov 29, 2006 · Member since Aug 2006 · 807 posts
I have a waterbath canner and have traditionally canned apples and tomatoes. I screwed up a curry the other night and decided to make a Vegetable soup with the left-over curry and some pumpkin soup from tonight. After blending with broth, I have close to a gallon. Since I don't have that much room in my freezer, I thought I'd can some.
The issue is most of the information that I have found on canning soups said to use a pressure canner and keep it under for 55 minutes. I don't have a pressure canner.
I understand there is some chemistry involved with canning, but not how that relates to vegetable soup.
Somehow I don't think I could tolerate the irony if I gave myself food poisoning from vegetable soup. Any ideas?
I'm a complete neophyte, but it seems to me that the reason you want a pressure canner is because the acidity in soup is too low to discourage bacteria through other canning methods.
Honestly, the only fermented and preserved products I've ever made by myself have been unsealed: sauerkraut (the sealing method was, I am not kidding, tighten the lids when it stops bubbling!), refrigerator pickles of various ilk, refrigerator-stored jam and chutney. I guess I was really rolling the dice, but I didn't ever get sick from any of these. That's not to say that you couldn't!
The sickest I've ever been is from getting contaminated water on my lips while showering in my apartment in Pacasmayo. I had a deep-seated fear of my cistern. I should have taken charge, and gone and skimmed out the (I'm sure) dead insects and possibly animals, scrubbed it, and bleached the daylights out of it. Instead I "just lived with it and tried not to consume any." (I include tales of my own idiocy in case you needed personal testimony as to why my advice on bacterial contamination is flawed.)
you're funny!
I've been doing some poking around on-line and I think if it was tomato soup, I'd be OK, but because it is mostly pumpkin, I probably better freeze it. I'll go clean out a spot...I hope.
thanks for your tale. You made me laugh on a day spent in crisis mode (not because of the soup, I'm not that sensitive ;).
I think it's wise to freeze it, after all, using all the energy to can only 4 quarts goes against the grain with this Womble! However I will say, my mother used to can animal products (chicken etc) and we were taught to prepare the food for consumption by bringing the contents of the jar to a full boil and letting it boil for 10 minutes to kill any poss bacteria. Over many years we never had any food poisoning. But I agree, for that small an amount, freezing is better.
Hi. The USDA is a great source of information about preserving and canning stuff at home. They have a comprehensive website and literature that you can order.
According to their site, canning vegetable soup by water bath is not safe. They only recommend pressure canning.
This is the link:
http://www.uga.edu/nchfp/index.html
yabbitgirl, my family always did hot water bath canning rather than pressure canning, too. I think they learned how before the food-safety guys decided that a pressure canner was safer... at any rate, we never got sick from all the things they canned. I think the recommendations are probably (as usual) overkill... but I'm not SURE enough to advise anyone to the contrary.
I DID have to talk my mom into getting rid of the things grandma canned like 6 years ago-- it's hard to do for sentimental reasons but I don't want her eating it and getting sentimentally sick as a dog.
Good link, jkl!