Things to Consider Before Preserving Your Harvest
Millions of Americans pickle, can, freeze, dry, and ferment the abundance of summer fruits and vegetables from their gardens and local farms. Here are a few things you should remember to keep your hard-earned harvest safe to eat!
My family has been growing all their own food and canning for generations. It’s exciting to see a huge resurgence of interest in home gardening and buying directly from growers at farmers’ markets, pick-your-own operations, enterprises, and farm stands.
However, with this resurgence come many beginners learning to can and preserve food. Many home food processors use practices that put them at high risk for foodborne illness and economic losses due to food spoilage.
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Follow Today’s Safety Standards
The only way to ensure safe food is to follow to the letter the most up-to-date, tested, science-based methods for safe food handling, processing, and preparation, such as those provided by the , based at the University of Georgia.
The National Center for Home Food Preservation (NCHFP) is where all canning companies and consumers can go to find current research and education on home food preservation.
The center helps develop and disseminate current science-based advice on canning, freezing, drying, curing & smoking, and fermenting.
The advice and guidance of the NCHFP are considered the gold standards in home canning today.
Chamille White/Shutterstock.
Stick to Current Methods and Recipes
Let go of that cherished family recipe for water-bath canned mincemeat. Don’t use the books and recipes you’ve relied on since the 1970s. Even books from a few years ago may contain information that won’t pass muster by today’s food-safety standards.
For example, tomatoes were always considered acidic enough (pH below 4.6) to process safely in a boiling-water bath. But a few years ago, researchers found that many of the varieties they tested, including some old favorites, weren’t acidic enough for safe water-bath canning and began recommending that home processors can tomatoes in a pressure canner and always add bottled lemon juice, powdered citric acid, or vinegar to each jar of tomato product before processing. See the ÃÛÌÒÁµÈË’s Pressure Canning Guide to learn how to can foods safely.
Whether you’re taking to the canning kettle, the food dehydrator, or the big freezer for the first time or consider yourself a seasoned vet, make your big effort pay off as you package up summer flavors. Keep it from spoiling and keep it safe.
Learn More
- : Everything you need to know about canning, freezing, drying, fermenting, pickling, curing and smoking, and common storage.
- : Information about the CDC’s research into foodborne illness.
Margaret Boyles
Introduction to Preserving
Freezing
Making Quick Pickles
Making Quick Jams: Refrigerator or Freezer Jam
Water-Bath Canning
How to Can Tomatoes
How to Can Pickles
How to Can Jam and Jelly
Pressure Canning
Drying
Salting and Brining
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How long can you keep home can goods?
I plan on canning fresh Tuna soon. Do you know what adjustment for pressure canner at 4000'?? Thank you. And BTW very good advice about not using 'Granny's ' old recipes and methods!
Here're the instructions you need, Morty. The tables at the end show altitude-adjusted pressure requirements for both dial-gauge and weighted-gauge pressure canners.
Good luck!
You could run all those tomatoes thru a blender or use an emulsifier which is a hand held blender-very handy. don't strain them as you waste a lot of tomatoes..good luck.
Last time I tried canning tomatoes, it came out fine, but the sauce was all chunky which makes sense. But, my family and I like smooth tomato sauce and not chunky so how do I get all the extra "chunks" out? Do I use a strainer?
I like to use an immersion blender. Some people also claim that leaving the seeds in the tomatoes makes the sauce bitter, so that's also something to think about. It really depends on your preference though.
