The Amish Canning Cookbook (3 page)

• Speaking of lunches, I’m not tempted to go out for lunch on those mornings when I’m getting ready for work and suddenly remember that I forgot to plan for the day’s meal. Instead, I can grab a jar of soup or stew and heat that up instead of getting fast food or some other less healthy or more expensive choice.

• Canning produces a self-reliant streak. Even if we were to experience an extended power outage, I could still feed my family. And if I found myself in a worst-case scenario, I could take care of my family for as long as needed by canning on my outdoor propane stove or even over an open fire. That’s food confidence you can’t buy in a grocery store.

• I never add preservatives or additives to my home-canned food. It’s just good, plain, nutritious food inside those jars.

• I don’t have to worry about BPA leaching into my food because I don’t use cans.

• My home-canned food tastes better than store-bought. And because I’m the cook as well as the canner, I can tweak the ingredients and seasonings to please my palate.

• I’m free to concentrate on storing more of the foods my family enjoys. For instance, we really enjoy canned peaches. And while I can’t seem to find organic canned peaches at my local grocery store, I
can
get organic fresh peaches in season. Putting up several canner loads each summer means my family gets to eat something they love, and I have the satisfaction of knowing they’re eating food that’s organic and pure.

• Canning is easier on the environment than filling my cupboards with store-bought canned food. By canning my own food, I don’t contribute to wasteful packaging and transportation costs. And because I use my jars again and again, it’s less wasteful.

• Unexpected guests? No problem. I can always go to my shelves and make a meal in a hurry.

• Home-canned foods make great gifts.

• I experience personal satisfaction, knowing that by the work of my hands, my family is fed.

• Canning is enjoyable! I consider it a form of entertainment, and instead of spending money for that entertainment (like for movies, concerts, athletic events, etc.), I like to think I’m
making
money instead.

We are so fortunate to live in these times, where we can rest assured that proper canning practices can virtually guarantee that our families eat safely processed food. And because of this, we can take advantage of seasonal gluts of home-grown produce or great sales at our local grocery stores or farmers’ markets to put food on our tables. Yes, canning is an old-time homemaker’s skill, but it fits perfectly in the modern kitchen as well. I hope you give it a try. You may find that it’s not simply a passing fancy, and that preserving jars of delicious food fits well in your routine. I firmly believe that you and your loved ones will be the glad beneficiaries.

ALL ABOUT CANNING

1

A BRIEF HISTORY OF CANNING

W
hen we think of home canning, our mind’s eye is quick to envision neat rows of jars lining pantry shelves, safely filled with food just waiting to be opened so we can prepare a variety of tasty meals for our dear families. From the excess of summer gardens come the ingredients for many appetizing feasts during the cold winter months. Let those winter storms blow in—we have the satisfaction of knowing that our families will be well nourished because our pantry shelves are filled with a bit of summer’s abundance.

Canning our own food seems the epitome of the industrious homemaker, but canning did not begin as an answer to the housewife’s problem of what to have for dinner. Instead, canning was developed as an answer to a question posed by war. In the late 1700s, Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte of France was concerned that his soldiers were not being fed well when they traveled long distances from home, and he realized that they needed a reliable method for keeping food safe to eat for long periods. So he offered a cash prize to the person who could develop a dependable method of food preservation.

Enter Nicolas Appert, a French candy maker, brewer, distiller, and chef. Appert discovered that when heat was applied to food in sealed glass bottles, the food was preserved. In the early 1800s, the French navy successfully experimented with foods preserved by heat on their long voyages. They ate preserved meat, vegetables, fruit, and milk. But it would take more than 50 years to provide the reason for
why
the canning process worked. Finally, Louis Pasteur demonstrated that the growth of microorganisms causes food spoilage, and that sealing food into jars or cans using high heat kills these microorganisms, thus rendering the canned food safe to eat months, and even years, later.

Several years after Appert’s discovery, an Englishman by the name of Peter Durand figured out how to successfully seal food in tin-coated iron cans, and in 1813 the first commercial canning factory was established in England. These cans of food were very expensive, and a person needed a chisel and hammer to open the container, but even so, the food canning industry was launched. Canned food was largely used by the military and explorers, and it wasn’t until the 1920s that home canning caught on with homemakers.

In 1858, a Philadelphia tinsmith named John Mason patented a glass “fruit jar,” which incorporated threads at the jar’s top along with matching threads on a metal band that was screwed down on top of a zinc lid with a rubber gasket. For the first time, a canning jar system was easy to use and within reach of even modest budgets. Then in 1882, the Lightning jar was introduced. These glass jars had glass lids that used metal clamps to hold the lid and a rubber gasket in place. Atlas jars also used this system. In fact, the Lightning-type jar system was manufactured in the United States until the 1960s, and European companies still manufacture these jars (Weck and Leifheit are two such companies). They are very beautiful jars that come in many shapes and sizes.

Meanwhile, in the United States, Ball jars (1886) and Kerr jars (1903) began being made with the two-piece rings and lids we are used to seeing today. The metal lid came with a permanently attached gasket that sealed the food inside the jars. The companies were eventually combined, and today the Jarden Corporation manufactures and sells Ball, Kerr, Bernardin (sold mostly in Canada), and Golden Harvest jars.

One other development of note occurred in 1976 when Stieg Tattler reusable lids went on the market. During the 1960s and 1970s, at the height of the “back to the land” movement, there was such a resurgence of interest in home canning that jars and lids were often hard to come by, and the introduction of Tattler reusables was a direct result of this dearth. Tattler lids are made from a dense plastic compound that is BPA-free. A reusable rubber ring or gasket makes the seal. Tattler lids and rubber rings have been shown to last twenty years or more, and often after many years of use, the only replacements needed are the rubber rings.

Even though the canning process itself has changed little over the last two hundred years, research and trials led by universities and government agencies have honed the safety guidelines for specific foods being canned, and these are constantly being updated as needed. So even though you may have a recipe that has been handed down from your beloved grandmother or aunt, it’s best to rely on the most up-to-date data available. You can probably still use that old-time favorite recipe, but you may need to change the processing time or method. For the sake of your family’s safety, you’ll be well advised to do so.

2

GETTING STARTED

O
ver the years I’ve spoken with many people—mostly women—who would like to learn how to can food, but they have some trepidation regarding doing so safely. I want to encourage you that it’s not complicated or even mysterious, but rather, it’s a matter of following directions and sticking to them. When we are in the kitchen cooking or baking for our families and friends, if we choose to change up a recipe or experiment with ingredients we might end up with something that tastes awful, but it won’t make our loved ones sick. But in canning, following established procedures is necessary—this is no place to experiment! Now that’s not to say that you can never “invent” a recipe of your own choosing—you certainly can—but you will first want to get comfortable with the process and educate yourself on how to go about making changes judiciously.

There are two basic canning methods—boiling water-bath canning and pressure canning. And essentially, there are two groups of foods—high-acid foods with a pH of 4.6 or lower and low-acid (alkaline) foods, with a pH of more than 4.6. High-acid foods generally use the water-bath method and low-acid foods require pressure canning at higher-than-boiling temperatures to render them safe.

Following is an overview of the process for each method, but in the following chapters I’ll go into more detail, with specific, step-by-step instructions that you can follow when you are actually canning.

Boiling Water-Bath Canners

Boiling water-bath canning is used for high-acid foods such as jam, jelly, fruit butter, preserves, and marmalade; fruit pieces, fruit juice, and fruit pie filling; tomatoes, plain tomato sauce, and tomato juice (lemon juice or some other acidifier is added to tomato products to ensure that the acid level is high enough to safely can these foods with the boiling water-bath method); and pickles and relishes.

Any large pot with a tight-fitting lid will do, but water-bath canners made especially for canning foods are inexpensive and sized appropriately and are well worth the small investment. You will need a rack that sits on the bottom to keep the jars up from the floor of the pot, and the pot must be tall enough that the jars are covered by 2 inches of water with another 1 to 2 inches of air space above that. You can also use a pressure canner for water-bath canning as long as it is tall enough.

After you have prepared the food you plan on canning, fill the jars with the food or liquid, screw the lids and rings on, and then set them into the canner to which you have added enough hot water to fill it halfway. Once all your jars are in place, add more hot water if necessary to cover the jars by two inches. Cover and heat the canner until the water comes to a rolling boil (212°F, 100°C). Once a rolling boil has been achieved you will begin the processing time, which can be anywhere from 5 minutes to 1½ hours. During the processing time you can lower the heat a bit, but make sure that the water never stops boiling during the entire processing period.

Boiling the jars in the water removes the oxygen. This helps form a tight seal and is sufficient to kill the mold, yeast, and bacterial cells present in the food. And even though boiling at 212° doesn’t kill the
clostridium botulinum
spores—which cause botulism, a potentially deadly toxin—the high acid levels in foods with a pH that is 4.6 or less doesn’t allow the spores to grow. Therefore, the canned food is safe to consume.

Many people prefer to “get their feet wet” by water-bath canning before they take the plunge into pressure canning. But that’s really just a matter of preference (or possibly courage!), because pressure canning is just as simple—in fact, pressure canning green beans is probably the easiest food of all to preserve.

Pressure Canners

Pressure canning at temperatures higher than 212°F (100°C) is required for vegetables, meat, poultry, fish and seafood, and combination recipes that include low-acid foods. This is because the pH level is too high in these low-acid foods to prevent the growth of
clostridium botulinum
, which is the microorganism that causes botulism. When the spores are in an anaerobic environment (lacking oxygen, as happens to jars of food that are canned) they are able to grow and produce deadly levels of botulism toxin. Therefore, pressure is needed to raise the temperature, and pressure canning does that, raising the temperature inside the container to 240°F. When correctly processed for adequate periods of time, the botulinum spores are eliminated and the canned food is safe to store and eventually eat.

Unlike a water-bath canner, you will need to invest in a specially made pressure canner. And while the purchase price of a pressure canner isn’t small, this is an investment that will last you for many years when properly maintained. There are two types of pressure canners—those that use a gasket to close and seal the lids after they have been locked into place (such as the Presto brand), and those that are “gasketless” and seal by use of heavy-duty screws that tighten the locked lid to the body of the canner (such as the All American). The gasket canners generally cost less than the gasketless types, but you will need to replace the gaskets every year or so, depending on how much you use it. Gaskets cost less than 10 dollars, so this is a small additional expense, and with the money you saved on the purchase price compared to the gasketless types, you will still be ahead even after many years of use.

Pressure canners are also fitted with a dial or weighted gauge that indicates when the desired pressure (that is,
psi
, or pounds per square inch) has been reached inside the canner. Dial gauges must be watched during the entire time food is being processed to make sure the psi doesn’t fall below the recommended level. Also, you must test your dial gauge every year to make sure it still gives an accurate reading. On the other hand, weighted gauges exhaust small amounts of steam during the entire processing period, causing the weighted gauge to rock back and forth, so you won’t need to constantly be checking the gauge visually—instead, you’ll be able to know that the pressure is at the correct psi simply by hearing the rocking of the gauge, and this will allow you to move about more instead of being stuck close to the stove for long periods as when using a dial gauge. Another plus of the weighted gauge system is that unless you damage the gauge, you won’t need to get it tested annually.