Canning Resources

[GoatPackr]

I've been around canning since I was a kid. Taught my wife when we met and have canned for years. It's a great way to preserve food. But times have changed and you might find other ways of doing things that depending on your goals could work better.
Canning things like fruit for example uses sugar syrups. We have stopped due to not wanting sugar in our diets. Canning uses expensive jars and storage can be a problem.
We still like to can meat, fish, and some vegetables as well as freezing some things.
Consider freeze drying. Shelf life can he 25 or more years on many items. You don't need all the sugar or storage room and you don't need the expensive canning equipment.
The freeze dryer itself can be expensive but the rest of the process is much cheaper. You can use bags or jars that can be vacuumed down and put into buckets.
Liquids are turned into powder and use a fraction of the room and expense for storage.
Canning is a lot of work and if done in the house is very messy and hot.
Most importantly to us is you retain far more nutrition with freeze drying.

We are planning to order a Stay Fresh freeze dryer by summer.
Stay away from Harvest Right.

Kris

 

[BBob]

We are planning to order a Stay Fresh freeze dryer by summer.
Stay away from Harvest Right.

Any idea if they would sell the units without the pump? If not I think I’ll check with them as I already have several large high quality pumps sitting around.

 

[GoatPackr]

Any idea if they would sell the units without the pump? If not I think I’ll check with them as I already have several large high quality pumps sitting around.

Yes they will. Very helpful people and great customer service. They are coming out with a large machine in April.
Also you can hook multiple machines to 1 pump if you have a good pump sized for it.

Kris

 

[Harvey_NW]

My wife wants to start canning, we have never done it. Besides the blue book listed above, if we want to do large batches, which equipment is recommended? Not looking for cheapest, looking for easiest to use and best.
Any other books or sources of info?

The Presto 23QT is pretty hard to beat, IMO. Simple and effective, on the bigger side, and most hardware stores have replacement parts. I posted the link to the National Center for Food Prevention earlier in the thread, they have a ton of approved recipes.

 

[JohnB]

My wife wants to start canning, we have never done it. Besides the blue book listed above, if we want to do large batches, which equipment is recommended? Not looking for cheapest, looking for easiest to use and best.
Any other books or sources of info?

It's a totally reasonable thing to do. I'd recommend the big ~23 quart Presto canner too. The one bit of advice I have is to only buy Ball and Kerr jars and lids. I've had really bad luck using some of the cheaper lids including a memorable instance when all 11 Pur brand lids failed to seal while I was canning bear meat. The next year using only Ball jars I went 59/59 on sealed pints of bear meat!!

 

[wowzers]

My wife wants to start canning, we have never done it. Besides the blue book listed above, if we want to do large batches, which equipment is recommended? Not looking for cheapest, looking for easiest to use and best.
Any other books or sources of info?

If you want to do big batches and want the best get an All American 930. I can do 14 quarts or 19 pints in mine and there is no gasket to ever replace. Being able to run a double batch of quarts is a huge time saver. Not cheap though.

 

[BBob]

Not cheap though.

wowzers!!! I was looking at those about an hour ago.

 

[wowzers]

Your grand kids will be able to use it though.

 

[Team4LongGun]

If you want to do big batches and want the best get an All American 930. I can do 14 quarts or 19 pints in mine and there is no gasket to ever replace. Being able to run a double batch of quarts is a huge time saver. Not cheap though.

Ok we've since changed our mind on the size of batches