Kelly,

Those are all great questions. Before answering them, I thought I'd inquire whether you are familiar with safe canning practices, and approved recipes? By approved I mean they been rigorously tested for safety. One favorite source is the Ball Blue book, and another is the National Center for Home Food Preservation(NCHFP) I've attached a link below. I also read A LOT on the Harvest Forum here at GW. There are number of true experts on canning safety who have great advice to keep people like me on the safe track.

One of the most dangerous things I hear about people doing every year is canning their own favorite salsa recipe. Their argument for safety is 'it's never hurt me before.' The problem is, botulism, unlike other types of food poisoning is so often lethal, the first time. While tomatoes are often thought of as an acidic tasting food, for canning safety purposes tomatoes are not a high acid food, and require the addition of acid to the mix.

I don't want to get on a soap box, but because people can and do die because they didn't use safety approved recipes and techniques, I just wanted to do a Public Service Announcement, so to speak. It would be a shame to lose one of our wonderful Okie gardeners over something so easily prevented.

Seedmama

Here is a link that might be useful: NCHFP

And here's a link to the Harvest Forum to make it easy for you to visit. :)

Here is a link that might be useful: Harvest Forum

I'd like to add that I agree with everything Seedmama said, but also want to empahsize that there are some safe, approved canning recipes for some tomato products that are appropriate for use with a boiling water bath canner.

I can hundreds of jars of tomato products like salsa every year with a boiling water bath canner, and I use only safety-approved recipes from reliable sources, as Seedmama referenced above. And, I want to emphasize that the BWB canning of some tomato products is safe but only if you absolutely, positively follow the approved recipes to a "t" and change not one single ingredient in any way. You can't freelance and add more or less of any ingredient and you can't add any ingredients not included in the recipe and you can't exclude any ingredients that are on the list unless the recipe specifically so states.

I have a pressure canner but don't use it often. I like BWB canning so much more because, in general, it is much quicker.

Many of my favorite recipes, including those for Hanabero Gold Jelly and Annie's Salsa, are from the Harvest Forum here at GW.

Dawn, I agree, and didn't intend to imply that pressure canning is the only way to preserve safely. As I mentioned at the Fling, I pressure canned as a pre-teen, but have only done things as an adult I can do with Boiling Water Bath. This will be my first year with my new-to-me (used but tested) pressure canners. I got them through a classifed ad last year, 2 for $25. After adding necessary parts, I was in for about 2 for $50, which was still a very good deal. I agree BWB is much quicker. I'll have to really have my head in the game running two pressure canners, but I plan to let one cool down while I get the other one going.

While I'm on a roll, here's a link to the Ball website, with a note that Ball corporate no longer owns Ball Canning. It is now owned by Jardin.

Dawn, There's discussion on the Harvest forum right now about the comeback of pint and a half jars. Yippee! One pint of green beans just isn't enough for my hungry men.

Here is a link that might be useful: Ball Website

I've canned tomatos many times using a hot water bath. I also add lemon juice and salt to the bottom of my jar. There are a lot of safe ways to do it, just pick the method you are most comfortable with from a reliable source and follow the instructions to a T and you will be fine.

E

I own Janet Greene and Ruth Hertzberg's Putting Food By. She advocates pressure canning for tomatoes, but I'd much rather do it with a BWB. I've done my jams that way and am comfortable doing that. I will definitely check out the harvest forum. Thanks!

Kelly

Seedmama,

I know you weren't saying pressure canning was required for canning tomatoes, but since Kelly mentioned in her OP that she needed a pressure canner, I wanted to point out that you are able to can some tomato products without a pressure canner. I didn't want for anyone to think you could can tomato products only with a pressure canner because that might scare off folks who don't have and don't want a pressure canner.

Before we moved here, I hadn't canned very much as a adult--only for a few years in the 1980s and 1990s, but always canned with my dad in the 1960s and 1970s. I remember we were making plum jelly when RFK was shot and we had the TV on in the den, watching the news coverage while making jelly. Looking back, I am not sure I remember him using a recipe for his salsa, but maybe he'd made it for so many years that he didn't need a paper copy of a recipe. His salsa was always too hot for me to eat anyway! I slowly got back into canning, mostly in order to make salsa, jams and jellies, and then it all snowballed from there.

I still have some of my original canning tools from the 1980s....I think they almost qualify as antiques, although the jar lifter's magnet is so old it no longer picks up lids.

I haven't been over to the Harvest Forum in ages. I barely have time to get on this forum...and if I was doing what I am "supposed to" be doing, I'd be outside weeding right now. (I'll go outside in just a minute and start that!)

Kelly, I have that book and I like it, but I would not rely upon my copy of it for canning advice because it is out of date. I hope you have the latest edition that came out in 2010. Mine is much older, and in fact is much, much, much older. : )

All you need to be a canning whiz is the website Seedmama linked for the Home Center for Food Preservation. They are "the last word" on what is safe or not, approved or not, etc. I also love all the other websites she linked, and have a handful (a fairly small handful) of trusted canning recipe books I rely upon.

There are many new canning books coming out and I have concerns about how well-tested some of their recipes are and whether they meet current safety standards. The same is true of canning articles in magazines. In the last two years I've seen some outright incorrect information in some magazine articles on canning, followed up months later by published "corrections". Gee, let's hope no one used the incorrect recipes or instructions and contracted botulism or some other disease in the meantime. In recent years, if I see an interesting recipe in a "new" recipe book or magazine, I compare it to safe, approved recipes for something similar in an effort to determine if it seems to meet current safety standards.

We need a thread on what we like to can. Maybe I'll start one tonight. I really need to get out there to the garden and pull weeds!

You can trust the info at the NCHFP website because they are the final authority. You can trust the info at the Jardin/Ball and SureJell websites. You can trust the info at the Harvest Forum provided that the experts there haven't objected to something posted by somebody. There's some very knowledgeable people there and when someone who is newer to canning, or less experienced, or not as attentive to current safety rules, posts a recipe that is not safe or at least potentially not safe, the experts at the Harvest Forum are quick to jump in (for which we all should be very grateful) and point out that it is not a safe recipe.

I have seen people post salsa and tomato sauce recipes that are ridiculously unsafe and it sends a chill up my spine to think that people insist upon using "favorite family recipes" that are not safety-approved. It is like playing Russian Roulette with the life of anyone eating those products canned using unapproved recipes.

Canning is perfectly safe if done properly. If not done properly, it is a real safety risk.

And, by the way, you also can freeze raw tomatoes to preserve them as long as you intend to use them later in sauces, salsas, etc. where the change in texture after being frozen isn't an issue. You can make and freeze cooked salsas and sauces too instead of canning them. I use all the food preservation techniques I am able to squeeze into one harvest season, including fermentation.

Once you have a big veggie garden, you can raise so much of your family's annual food needs but that only works out really well if you're able to use the various safe food preservation methods to perserve some of the harvest for the future months. Even people who don't have a large veggie garden can buy at U-pick farms and orchards, have a CSA membership or buy when seasonal produce is at its peak harvest (thus, lowest price) and do a lot of food preservation. May is a great month to buy strawberries and freeze them or make jam because they are abundant and cheap!

A couple of years ago a local supermarket across the river from us in Gainesville, TX, had tomatoes for 25 cents a lb. Even though I had tons of tomatoes in the garden, I bought 20 or 30 lbs. and made a big batch (or 2 or 3) of salsa with them. It is hard to walk past tomatoes at a quarter a lb.

Now, I am headed out the door to pull weeds and I don't want y'all to post one more thing that will stop me from making it out that door!

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: Sure Jell Website

If anyone is in the market for a BWB canner with accessories, please e-mail me. I bought one; it's still in the box; and I doubt I will ever use it now. It's not an expensive one, but it does have the necessary accoutrements. I think the brand name is Lee.

Susan