Canning recipes, food preservation and food sales

[rbeau30]

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Watch your recipes. If you are making soups to can, leave out the milk, butter, cream ingredients. The soup will look strange, but that is OK. The milk products will likely go rancid during storage. When you pop the top months later to eat it, add the milk products then. It will taste just fine. I will put the left out ingredients and quantities on a sticker on the jar, or tie a tag to it. That way, a year later when you cannot find the original recipe, you can still make the soup.

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I have also read in many reputable recipes to leave out stuff like Beans and noodles and add them when you are ready to eat the canned food. Pressure canning these things can make them mushy etc.

[clodhopper]

I have also read in many reputable recipes to leave out stuff like Beans and noodles and add them when you are ready to eat the canned food. Pressure canning these things can make them mushy etc.

I don't can things with the goal of culinary perfection. Sustainable calories with enough variation to limit boredom. Canned soups are good on those cold days when you just want to heat up a quick lunch or when you are sick (stock rotation), who cares so much on the texture. I wouldn't serve it when the Queen comes to visit.

[rbeau30]

I don't can things with the goal of culinary perfection. Sustainable calories with enough variation to limit boredom. Canned soups are good on those cold days when you just want to heat up a quick lunch or when you are sick (stock rotation), who cares so much on the texture. I wouldn't serve it when the Queen comes to visit.

I agree with you there. We eat what we store and store what we eat.

While I may not be as picky... My offspring may not be too keen on eating some things (Also, when SHTF and that is all we have to eat, and they turn their noses up at the stuff I do have stored for calories, etc) then I guess my food storage will go a longer way for me then.

I definately would and do put the stuff that gets a little mushy *(beans, noodles, zuchinni, etc) after an hour and a half of pressure processing. I just figure that many people starting out into the canning and food preservation realm may want to be informed that things do not start out and end up the same way when you process recipes. They probably would be better to start out with something that is more like their recipe when they open it up to heat it up, to prevent getting discouraged. Something as simple as reserving the noodles to add to the soup until serving time may be a good trick for them. Also, many folks just getting into the canning world have expectations that the finished product will be much like a can of Campbells soup and I am trying to prevent them from being surprized.

I do however agree with you, canning is a great way to set aside some calories for when needed, and the shelf life on this stuff is amazing. I have soup stock and jellies/jams that are 100% delicious after 5-10 years.

Dairy stuff does not do well in preserved food... ick. However, One of the two things that I intend on attempting that I have not are canning butter, and dry heat canning (in the oven). I have read somewhere that this can be done with safe results. I do not like experimenting a whole lot with something like this, but It could be another tool in the shed to sock stuff away for when SHTF.


Having recently gotten into gardening and realizing that only a few zucchini plants can make more than I can ever eat in one season. I have a recipe with zukes that seems to have stood up to processing. I'll add it this weekend.

[clodhopper]

Also, many folks just getting into the canning world have expectations that the finished product will be much like a can of Campbells soup and I am trying to prevent them from being surprized.

Truth. I will look at canned goods in the grocery store for ideas on what else I can try canning, with the full knowledge that what I create will not look the same. I don't have all the fancy preservatives and stabilizers that get used in commercial canning, but then again, my canning doesn't have any of those chemicals and preservatives commonly used in canning, so win for me! I am always looking for ways to move what normally would be stored frozen, out of the freezer for no power required storage, so canning and drying. Kind of a challenge to figure out alternative storage to the freezer. Mostly driven by the freezer always being way too full.

I garden, but the clay soils where I live suck and the elevation doesn't help much. Mostly a salsa garden, lots of tomatoes, tomatillas, herbs, lettuce and peppers. We do a CSA with a farm that lets us select what we want. Most of that gets canned or dried, which covers nearly all the vegetables for the family all winter and all the dog food for the year.