What are you canning now?

[flowerbug]

some fruits and berries are relatively high in acidity, so they're my candidates for canning. Decide among them based on texture and sturdiness. Large fruits such as apples, pears, peaches, plums, and nectarines all can well. So do sturdy berries, such as strawberries and blueberries. Do you guys have any of these?

i grow strawberries, but i don't do cooked jams with them as i much prefer freezer jam. it's so much more fresh flavor i have no plans to ever do cooked strawberry jam ever again.

 

[YourRabbitGirl]

For the first time in many years we will not be canning anything from the garden. I will put up some apple sauce, apple pie filling and grape jelly though. And it may be a few years before we even plant a garden This year is so busy trying to get the other place finished, then next year will be getting the current place torn down and getting ready for new construction, financing, land work etc, etc... Then the following year we hope to start building the new house.

We will garden again.

That's sad to hear. In our family, canning became like a tradition the became like the norm. we always have something to can., I hope next year you guys are good.

 

[YourRabbitGirl]

Don't know if we have a thread like this one over here on the garden thread, but thought we should. Seems like a great place on BYC for folks to just chat about their current canning project and recipes they use, etc.

This past week I've been canning sweet corn, which we do in a steam canner instead of the pressure canner, which is a little different than most folks(we add acid with a thick slice of green mater at the top of the jar). Also canning hot pepper butter, slumgulleon(just a family name for throwing all the extra veggies into a skillet, cooking them down and thickening with cornmeal before using it as a sauce or gravy over something else), a small batch of green beans and some odds and ends of chickens that I've culled throughout the year and didn't get a chance to can with the larger batches of chicken.

Next week we'll probably can more sweet corn and then start moving into tomatoes. For tomatoes we'll just can up sauce, juice and diced tomatoes, as well as some salsa if I can access the right kind of tomatoes....mine were all pretty small this year and won't yield enough to do what I want.

Was discussing with the deer hunters in the family about really using more of the deer we harvest this year so that nothing goes to waste...more of the organs, more of the scraps of meat on the carcass that we would normally give to the dog, etc. I'd like to grind up the organ meat this year and maybe mix it with some pork sausage and spices to make a burger we will can up for use in spaghetti and other recipes calling for ground meats. The other meat we normally just cube and can as per normal, without grinding first.

Last year I cut up the carcass and boiled all the bones down in a huge stock pot and canned up that broth, picking all the meat from the bones and adding it to the broth as well. That makes a great soup base or gravy base later on. It's also a good way to get a lot more fat into the broth from the bone marrow that we wouldn't ordinarily get to glean.

Will add some pics here as we go along in our canning this year. Feel free to add to the thread with pics, recipes or just chat about what you are canning up throughout the year.

none yet but I'm planning to can turnips. it a good addition in any cooking, I hope I can harvest a hefty amount. I can't wait to do so.

 

[Zeedman]

Broke out some of the 2019 pickling experiments for testing, these are the results:

Chinese Red Noodle dilly beans - Turned out really well, even without the addition of crisper salt... and very eye catching, almost as red as canned beets. The crunchiness is spectacular! I'll be making a lot more of these in the future, but with less vinegar, and more mustard seed.

Okra: Tried 3 methods:
(1) cold packed & canned with hot brine
(2) pierced, then cold packed & canned with hot brine
(3) blanched, then packed & canned with hot brine

(1) was OK, but a lot of air that had been trapped in the pods emerged during the water bath.
(2) was better, the brine penetrated the pods, so there was very little trapped air, and the pickles were firmer.
(3) well, it was worth trying, but the quality was sub-par, soft to the point of unpleasantness. The water that entered the pods during blanching probably prevented the brine from entering rapidly, and also diluted its strength.

Pierced pods cold-packed will be my go-to method in the future. I'll try using some crisper salt this year to see if the firmness can be increased even further... but I'm quite happy with the #2's, nearly as good as the jars sold in stores.

Bitter melon:
Made two batches, sliced lengthwise into spears, then cold packed with hot brine. After some web research, packed a thick slice of fresh ginger in each jar. The flavor turned out OK, I could easily get used to it... but the texture was a fail, far too soft. I didn't use crisper salt in these, but doubt it would have made a difference. I know a bitter melon recipe for refrigerator pickles, but am trying to can larger quantities to add to our diet year-round.

Making canned bitter melon pickles is proving to be a challenge, due to their soft consistency. I'll try both cold brining this year before canning, and salting for 24 hours before pickling... and I'll try picking them when smaller. It could be that only certain varieties are suitable, or this project could be tilting at windmills; only time will tell, I suppose.

 

[flowerbug]

Broke out some of the 2019 pickling experiments for testing, these are the results:

Chinese Red Noodle dilly beans - Turned out really well, even without the addition of crisper salt... and very eye catching, almost as red as canned beets. The crunchiness is spectacular! I'll be making a lot more of these in the future, but with less vinegar, and more mustard seed.
...

i'm sure you know this, but don't reduce that vinegar by too much as it would then be unsafe unless you pressure can them.

otherwise, yes, i agree that dilly beans are an excellent crunch!

 

[YourRabbitGirl]

Don't know if we have a thread like this one over here on the garden thread, but thought we should. Seems like a great place on BYC for folks to just chat about their current canning project and recipes they use, etc.

This past week I've been canning sweet corn, which we do in a steam canner instead of the pressure canner, which is a little different than most folks(we add acid with a thick slice of green mater at the top of the jar). Also canning hot pepper butter, slumgulleon(just a family name for throwing all the extra veggies into a skillet, cooking them down and thickening with cornmeal before using it as a sauce or gravy over something else), a small batch of green beans and some odds and ends of chickens that I've culled throughout the year and didn't get a chance to can with the larger batches of chicken.

Next week we'll probably can more sweet corn and then start moving into tomatoes. For tomatoes we'll just can up sauce, juice and diced tomatoes, as well as some salsa if I can access the right kind of tomatoes....mine were all pretty small this year and won't yield enough to do what I want.

Was discussing with the deer hunters in the family about really using more of the deer we harvest this year so that nothing goes to waste...more of the organs, more of the scraps of meat on the carcass that we would normally give to the dog, etc. I'd like to grind up the organ meat this year and maybe mix it with some pork sausage and spices to make a burger we will can up for use in spaghetti and other recipes calling for ground meats. The other meat we normally just cube and can as per normal, without grinding first.

Last year I cut up the carcass and boiled all the bones down in a huge stock pot and canned up that broth, picking all the meat from the bones and adding it to the broth as well. That makes a great soup base or gravy base later on. It's also a good way to get a lot more fat into the broth from the bone marrow that we wouldn't ordinarily get to glean.

Will add some pics here as we go along in our canning this year. Feel free to add to the thread with pics, recipes or just chat about what you are canning up throughout the year.

Canned fruit and vegetable intake is associated with 'higher diet, lower body weight and lower blood pressure.' Canned vegetables have almost as much nutritional value as fresh vegetables and can taste just as good. ... We will save you time and money and lead to a healthier eating style.

 

[henless]

Just a little FYI:

I will be needing a few more jars this year for my canning. I thought I would go ahead and order them today for pick up at Walmart (I was going to get my daughter to pick them up for me). Well, the only stores that had any for pick up were over an hour away from me. So, I ended up ordering them online to be delivered. It's going to be about 2 weeks before I get them.

Just thought I'd give y'all a heads up in case anyone was needing jars. You may want to get them sooner rather than later.

 

[TwinCitiesPanda]

Just a little FYI:

I will be needing a few more jars this year for my canning. I thought I would go ahead and order them today for pick up at Walmart (I was going to get my daughter to pick them up for me). Well, the only stores that had any for pick up were over an hour away from me. So, I ended up ordering them online to be delivered. It's going to be about 2 weeks before I get them.

Just thought I'd give y'all a heads up in case anyone was needing jars. You may want to get them sooner rather than later.

I'm seeing a lot of things go out of stock/into high demand that normally do not. I buy my vegetable seeds primarily from individuals (via Etsy) and am seeing shops post that they are stopping sales to catch up with unusually high demand. Coupling that with the run on flour and yeast (neither of which I've ever seen out of stock everywhere in my life until now) I'm suspecting there are a large number of people who are looking to improve their self-sufficiency a bit. I wonder how many are first-time bakers or canners or vegetable growers. I'm trying hard to make an attitude adjustment and prepare myself to accept that it may not be too long before convenience items I'm accustomed to having will either be unavailable out of my price range. Leave it to me to buy a house six months before a massive recession kicks in. My brother bought his house in early 2008. Maybe we are genetically predisposed to poor real estate decisions.

 

[flowerbug]

I'm seeing a lot of things go out of stock/into high demand that normally do not. I buy my vegetable seeds primarily from individuals (via Etsy) and am seeing shops post that they are stopping sales to catch up with unusually high demand. Coupling that with the run on flour and yeast (neither of which I've ever seen out of stock everywhere in my life until now) I'm suspecting there are a large number of people who are looking to improve their self-sufficiency a bit. I wonder how many are first-time bakers or canners or vegetable growers. I'm trying hard to make an attitude adjustment and prepare myself to accept that it may not be too long before convenience items I'm accustomed to having will either be unavailable out of my price range. Leave it to me to buy a house six months before a massive recession kicks in. My brother bought his house in early 2008. Maybe we are genetically predisposed to poor real estate decisions.

what matters right now is your knowledge and safety. once you can get a garden planted then things improve with each day towards harvest. the fresh air and exercise do me a tremendous amount of good.

 

[henless]

@TwinCitiesPanda - We were just thinking about putting ours up for sale and getting something smaller. It's just DH & I. We don't a 2 story house.

I've also went back and ordered some more seeds that I will/might be needing later this summer for fall & winter. In fact, they just came in the mail today.