Some thoughts on food canning....

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If you can can, go for it. You'll get a product that rivals the best that the commercial canners can put out and it'll be tailor made to your life style. With that said, let me say I've decided not to have the majority of my goodies canned by home methods for the following reason. Since Murphy follows me all the time and doesn't like me much I'll not be putting the most expensive of my food stores into jars. Why, because I feel in my heart of hearts that My food storage will freeze and those jars will crack and I'll be SOL (S**t out of luck). But if you have a nice place to put your storage where old man winter can't get you, CAN it ALL. You'll save big bucks and have food that you know is right.

Later nine

-- nine (nine_fingers@hotmail.com), November 24, 1998

Answers

You can order wide mouth canning jars from Wal-Mart for $7.00 a dozen. Order extra lids and sealers too. Did research with several people who can or whose folks canned - it takes about 300 quarts/year/person if you eat primarily canned food. Divided evenly between fruits, veggies (includes soups, pasta sauce, etc), meats (all those baby chickens from spring grow up at the same time, same way with the turkeys around Nov/Dec). Get a good set of equipment, follow directions absolutely, and use common sense when opening the jars later (follow the directions). Easy, cheap, tastey. Remember that sugar is an ingredient in fruit canning, so plan ahead now.

Wisconsin Aluminum Foundry Co.,Inc. P.O. Box 246 Manitowoc, WI 54220 414-682-8286

Bout as heavy duty pressure cooker as you can get. No seals. Metal to metal. Seven different sized models. Smallest wont' even hold a quart jar, to the largest (which I've had since 1986) model 941 which holds 19 quart jars (I get slightly less). I think the 941 ran about $150.

Best you can buy.

mitch

-- Mitchell Barnes (spanda@inreach.com), November 24, 1998.


If you're going to do wet-pack canning at home, for heaven's sake be sure you learn how to do it properly. Otherwise you can kill yourself and your family (can you say, "Botulism?") Talk to your county agricultural extension service agent and see if they still teach courses in canning the way they once did.

nemo...

-- nemo... (nemo@deepsix.com), November 25, 1998.


I recently went down to the local ag extension office to pick up or order the USDA Canning opus. Not only did they not have it, they had no way to order it, didn't even ask if they gave demonstrations.

http://www.foodsafety.org/canhome.htm These documents were extracted from the "Complete Guide to Home Canning," Agriculture Information Bulletin No. 539, USDA. Reviewed 1994. and

Use Deja News search for FAQ in newsgroup rec.food.preserving It is 6 sections, about 500k. mitch

-- Mitchell Barnes (spanda@inreach.com), November 26, 1998.


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