Every year, as winter draws to a close, my heart starts dreaming of canning season. I begin making mental notes of what I have enough of and what I need. But if you’re new to the canning game, this process may seem overwhelming. And believe me, it’s easy to get frazzled when it comes to canning.
Whether you prefer canning, freezing, fermenting or dehydrating we all have the same end goal in mind, to preserve food. If you don’t have a game plan, the summer can easily pass you by and before you know it fall is here and you’re in a scramble to put food up. Here are some canning tips to save time, money and energy. And hopefully it makes your canning season a little better so you can get the most taste and quality out of your preserved goodness.
1. Set Goals
What are your goals for canning? You may want to save your family money or you may just enjoy the craft of it. You may have a garden and want to enjoy reaping the benefits of it all year long. You may enjoy canning because you have control over what goes into it (like no chemicals and preservatives).
You may have only one goal, or a few that I listed above. Think about your goals. Why do you want to do this and what do you want to get out of it?
I can for a few different reasons. I love that it saves our family money, it’s super yummy, it’s convenient and honestly I just really love canning. I love knowing that I can run downstairs and grab a jar of spaghetti sauce or chicken broth.
2. Check Your Inventory
–Check dates: It’s very important to mark dates on each jar you preserve for this reason, oldest food needs used first.
–Spoilage: Do a visual check of seals and quality. If something is unsealed, discard it straight away. The food inside may still look normal and fine, but if it’s unsealed it needs discarded. Also check for discoloration even on sealed jars, that could mean it has spoiled.
3. Understand Canning Styles {there are two}
-Hot water bath canning: submerge canned foods in hot water and boil the jars for a certain length of time
-Pressure cooker canning: enclose canned foods in a pressure cooker and process them for a certain length of time. The temperature inside a pressure cooker is higher than is possible in a pot of boiling water. I’ve written an in-depth guide to pressure canning here.
4. Check Your Jars
Save the heartache of unsealed lids or money wasting broken jars (and ruined food) in the canner by doing a careful inspection first before putting any food inside. Check your jars carefully for cracks, chips and defects. Here is a great in-depth post of how to properly inspect your jars.
Take inventory of your empty canning jars so you have an idea of how many you have on hand. Watch the local sale flyers, normally around canning season stores will have sales. The jars will need washed before use. I fill my dishwasher up and start the cycle when I start my canning. Not only are the jars clean, but they’re normally still warm when I’m ready for them.
- Tip: Hold on to the original boxes for storage. Let me say that again, hold on to the original boxes. When this girl started canning, she threw those boxes away. Big mistake! I store my canned food in the basement, and those boxes make life so much easier when you’re carrying precious jars of amazingness down flights of stairs.
5. Check Your Equipment
Even if you are a seasoned canner, you normally find that first canning session awkward. Finding your rhythm takes a bit. Preparing ahead of time can make the process so much easier. An important step is taking the time to evaluate your canning equipment.
-Canning Tools: Gather together all your canning utensils before beginning.
- spoons – I prefer wooden
- jar rack – a rack that fits inside your canner to hold jars
- magnetic lid lifter – a tool for picking up and placing just one lid at a time
- canning funnel – to get liquids into the jars without spilling all over
- jar lifter – essential for getting hot jars out of hot water safely
- food mill – used for mashing and sieving
-Canners: If you’re planning on canning anything that requires the water bath method, you’ll need a pot tall enough to accommodate your jars. Make sure your pot has enough room for a couple inches of boiling water and a couple inches of head room above that is fine for boiling water bath canning. Your pot will also need to have a canning rack in it.
Some of the items you’re planning to can may require pressure canning {green beans is one example}. Wash and rinse your canner to start with. Check the sealing rings and over-pressure plug. Replace if needed. These should be replaced every two to three years. Review your canner’s manual to refresh your memory of the canning procedure.
-Lids and Rings: Check over all your rings and discard the ones that are distorted, dented, or rusty as they could cause your jars not to seal properly. If you’re like me, you always have way more rings than you’ll ever use. I’m not quite sure how that happens honestly. If you are buying new jars, a lot of times they will come with lids and rings. Purchase plenty of new lids early in the season. You don’t want to run out when elbow deep in sauce.
- Tip: Purchase a medium size plastic tote to store all your canning items in. It not only makes storage easier, but it keeps them from getting separated and lost.
- Tip: To store your extra rings, buy a spool of twine and cut a piece around 3-4 ft. in length (depending on how many rings you have to store). Tie the end of your twine to one ring and then thread the twine through all the rings. The ring tied onto the twine at the bottom will hold all the other rings on there. Tie a loop on the other end of the twine. Now you can hang all your extra rings up! I got this tip from my Mama.
6. Choose Your Recipes
You’ll need to sort out your recipes and decide what you’re canning. So before you begin, search out recipes in your favorite cookbook or look on Pinterest. Here is a link to my Pinterest board all about canning. There are so many amazing canning recipes there! Also be watching my blog for an upcoming post, my top 5 favorite canning recipes!
7. Buy Your Basics
Pull out all those recipes, read over them and make sure you have the ingredients on hand. Trust me, this is important. You don’t want to get your spaghetti sauce nearly done and realize you’re out of tomato paste. Been there, done that.
There are some items that I already know I will use a ton of throughout canning season. Tomato paste, vinegar, salt, sugar and ketchup are my must-haves for canning season. Your basics might also include pectin and bottled lemon juice. If you know what items you’ll need a lot of, it may be better to buy them in bulk at Sams or Costco.
Check through your spices, too, and make sure you’re good for italian seasonings, cinnamon, pickling spice, or whatever spices you know will be used. I highly recommend buying your spices in bulk. Fresh spices mean tastier preserves!
8. Break Up The Process
Who says it all has to be done in one day? I mean, I obviously wouldn’t put my tomatoes through the food mill and leave them wait…but there are some things that can be divided. This tip has saved me so much stress over the years: break up canning tasks when ever possible. Some examples:
- Pick & wash green beans today, snap them tomorrow, can them the day after that.
- Grind zucchini, cucumbers, onions and peppers for relish today and put in the fridge tonight. Can tomorrow.
- Chop the onions, garlic, and peppers for your recipe a few days ahead of time and store in the fridge.
- Husk corn and store in the fridge, cut it off the cob and process the next day.
9. Slow Cook Sauces
When making ketchup, barbeque sauce, fruit butters, bacon jam, etc. Puree the ingredients and put it into your slow cooker. Prop the lid open with chopsticks or dull kitchen knives so the steam can escape. Put it on low and let it do it’s thing. Let it cook for as long as necessary to get a thick sauce, stirring every now and then. This is much easier than standing over a hot stove cooking and stirring, or taking the chance of it scorching on the stovetop.
10. Invite Your Girls Over
An important part of this process is not overwhelming yourself. And if this is your first time canning, trust me, you’ll want all the help you can get. Especially if it’s someone who has canned prior. Plus it’s just more fun to do this kind of work with another person. Chatting and laughing make the day go faster!
And there you have it. You’re all ready for a fun-filled day of canning. And listening for that ping ping coming from your kitchen later in the day.
