12
votes
Accepted
For Pressure Canning, can I use any other jar than Ball’s Mason Jar?
The important part of the system are the lids. The ideal lids are the Mason-type (no matter which company produced them), with a flat top and a separate side piece with thread.
Another type that ...
11
votes
Can I reprocess jars that have sealed?
Official advice (which is the only sort here on food safety issues) is to empty, and repack into a clean jar with a new lid.
But why? It sealed, and I'm going to process it more?
Because the ...
10
votes
Accepted
Food safety and botulism indicators for pressure canned goods
The layer on the top is either separated fat from the ham and bouillon cubes, or a bacterial and/or fungal growth (aka a "pellicle"). If it feels greasy and/or brittle and becomes ...
8
votes
Accepted
Is pressure canning, weeks after regular canning safe?
I can't come up with a way to do this that is not problematic.
First, no canning authority I can find provides instructions on how to re-can under pressure food that is already canned. The closest ...
6
votes
Accepted
Pressure canner physics
pouring 3 litres of water inside it with the lid slightly open and waiting for the water to boil.
Good. You definitely want to get everything up to local boiling. The amount of water is reasonable ...
6
votes
Accepted
Why let a pressure canner vent, before putting the weight on?
In canning, you have to be very sure that you have produced the exact conditions needed for the process to work properly. If you deviate a bit, it can happen that bacterial spores survive. These "...
6
votes
Accepted
Hot-canning non-acidic, pressure cooked food
While that'd be a lot less risky than no pressure cooking at all, it's not fully safe. For complete safety, it's important that the actual canning processing be pressure cooking.
The problem is, even ...
6
votes
Accepted
Pressure canning at odd pressures
I just spoke with someone from Presto - apparently, the pressure is meant to be maintained by adjusting the heat source, and the weight provided with the canner is meant only to build pressure and not ...
5
votes
Pressure canning tomatoes without added acid
According to Putting Foods By, 25th ed. (1982), you can fill tomato jars with just hot boiled tomato juice rather than requiring additional acid, and then pressure-can them:
10lbs pressure / 40 ...
5
votes
Hot-canning non-acidic, pressure cooked food
No. This is not a safe method of canning low acid food.
When we talk about "sterilization" in a home environment, we are utterly fooling ourselves. The SECOND the sanitized jars come out of the hot ...
4
votes
Canning for couple of days to one week of low acidic cooked food without pressure canning?
NO! Using your method you have created the perfect environment to grow Clostridium botulinum, so within a couple of days you very well could have a thriving colony of botulism rich food.
From USDA ...
4
votes
For Pressure Canning, can I use any other jar than Ball’s Mason Jar?
For home pressure canning, you should always use a Mason jar (Ball is one brand, but there are others). A "Mason jar" is the kind with the two-piece lid.
When using home equipment, the two-piece lid ...
4
votes
Accepted
What are the 3 vents / weights on this Chinese pressure canner?
Which valve is which?
See labels below:
When to use the auto valve?
According to user manual Page 6, Section 5.7, you are supposed to move the handle on the auto valve at least twice a week to make ...
4
votes
Accepted
Canned Peppers: Very subtle acidic taste
It sounds like (benign, tasty) lactic acid bacteria fermentation, possibly along with leuconostoc or something. But without the appropriate levels of salt, it's also possible that less friendly ...
4
votes
My jars sealed, cold packed raw chicken quarts, but canner ran dry towards the end. Can I reprocess within 24 hrs when my new canner arrives?
No, they are not safe to re-process. This essentially has become a "can I partially cook foods, cool and then finish cooking" question (such as the linked one).
Without the proper cooking ...
3
votes
Out of power after one hour of canning
Barring the somewhat unlikely case that the pot was boiling with pressure maintained for 15 minutes with the power off, official advice is that the timer restarts from zero after an interruption (so ...
3
votes
Accepted
Adjusting pressure setting and processing time when modifying pressure canning recipe
No modifications are necessary.
The pressure of the canner entirely determines the temperature of the water around the jar, and you don’t start timing until the canner is at that temperature/pressure, ...
3
votes
Why let a pressure canner vent, before putting the weight on?
Have a look at this:
Air and Steam Mixture
Mere pressure at up to 30 PSI ('15 PSI' on the gauge is really ~30 PSI absolute at sea level) will do nothing to pasteurize your food. It's high heat that ...
3
votes
Accepted
How to pressure can grilled paprika
The book Putting Food By recommends canning pints or half pints (about the range you have) of hot-pack pimentos at 10lbs pressure (240F/116C) for 20 minutes (sorry for the American measurements, it's ...
3
votes
Using a Power Pressure Cooker XL for high altitude canning above 6000 ft sea level
BEWARE that no electric pressure cookers have been approved for pressure canning by the USDA. The National Center for Home Food Preservation actually put out a bulletin after manufacturers, like the ...
2
votes
Pressure canning at odd pressures
I agree that those pressures are odd. I haven't personally seen recipes with such non-standard pressures.
I've found that nearly all recipes I use call for either 10 or 15 lbs of pressure. Obviously ...
2
votes
Accepted
Pressure canner vs water bath at altitude
Nothing opinion-based about it. If you are canning anything that's "low-acid" you need a pressure canner, regardless of altitude.
That's "higher pressure than at sea level."
Boiling water bath ...
2
votes
Method of canning without pressure canner?
I am working on a related question and I have discovered that there is an industrial process for canning at atmospheric pressure called "Flame Sterilization."
Flame Sterilization works using very ...
2
votes
What are the 3 vents / weights on this Chinese pressure canner?
Not a full answer, but I found the video on this page showing how to use a very similar device (no sound that I can see, and text in Chinese) on Alibaba.
It seems that the two valves with sort of ...
2
votes
What should be the weight of an 80 kPa pressure canner jiggler/pressure regulator valve?
Basically, pressure from the steam lifts the jiggler. The amount of pressure needed to lift it is determined by both the weight of the jiggler and the shape of the opening. There is no single weight ...
2
votes
Accepted
I put canned meat back in the pressure canner to process longer- is that ok?
So, they have been over-processed, which is not a big deal for something like broth where you don't have any crispness you are trying to keep by limited processing time.
You're worried that the seal ...
2
votes
My jars sealed, cold packed raw chicken quarts, but canner ran dry towards the end. Can I reprocess within 24 hrs when my new canner arrives?
Yes, they are safe to reprocess within 24 hours.
Home canning of meat products was formerly the norm for preservation and food security prior to refrigeration. For those unfamiliar, refer to these ...
1
vote
Can I pressure cook nested containers?
Any container can be pressure cooked to recommended temperatures given enough time in the cooker. This may cause the food inside to become overcooked. But that's not your main problem with this ...
1
vote
Accepted
Head space in Weck jars
I just checked the Weck (the manufacturer) website (German, sorry) and the recommended head space is
Full if you are processing fruits or vegetables that get topped up with a liquid like water or ...
1
vote
Head space in Weck jars
I use the cylindrical jars from Weck and would say that the headroom can be kept the same in general. At the end of the day you just don't want any stuff to swell over and not have too little in there ...
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