Canning Meat

Discussion in 'Back to Basics' started by Motomom34, Nov 8, 2018.


  1. Meat

    Meat Monkey+++

    I thought I got the permanent ban. Too many hot-air balloon jokes. Well they’re not really jokes I suppose. All true. :whistle:
     
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  2. SB21

    SB21 Monkey+++

    Hmm,,which are you referring to ,,,the balloons ??? Or the Hot-air ???
    :ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO:
    Just kiddin',,
     
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  3. SB21

    SB21 Monkey+++

    I just did a little more investigating on the cooker pot I have and it is a Pressure Cooker / Canning pot , 21 qt . So I will start looking into the process of canning . Please post up any useful tips for some safe canning if you have them.
     
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  4. T. Riley

    T. Riley Monkey+++

    Get the Ball Canning Guide. You may be able to find it as a PDF on line. Then do something simple like one jar of fresh green beans to get your confidence up. Then, can a package of chicken breast in a couple of jars and you'll be on you way. One tip. I boil my hamburger meat before I can it. Not to cook it, but to extract as much fat as possible. Then I rinse it in hot water and can it in beef broth to replace any lost flavor.
     
  5. BTPost

    BTPost Stumpy Old Fart,Deadman Walking, Snow Monkey Moderator

    I think the the Ball Canning Guide is here on the Monkey, in the Resouces area....
     
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  6. SB21

    SB21 Monkey+++

    Not sure it was the Ball guide , but i found about 10 guides there. I found it on page 6 . Thanks fellas , I'll start reading thru them.
     
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  7. Motomom34

    Motomom34 Monkey+++

    Here is a Ball canning resource. Cooking & Food - BALL. BLUE BOOK of CANNING and. PRESERVING RECIPES also, if you go to tags and select canning you will find all sorts of threads. Plus many can answer any questions.
     
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  8. TnAndy

    TnAndy Senior Member Founding Member

    We've canned meat over the years, but mostly can it as a finished, ready to heat 'n eat, product like chili, stew, spaghetti sauce, etc. Worked great when we were both working, could come in and get an evening meal on the table pretty quick when needed. Now we're both retired, we tend to cook more fresh, but will still put up some when we have an excess of ground beef or chicken from a slaughter.

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    Occasionally I can up an entire deer for the dogs:

    [​IMG]

    And we can our bacon each year from our pigs. Used to can it raw:

    [​IMG]


    But what we'd find on opening a jar is the processing time would cook the raw bacon so much it would fall apart when it came out of the jar.....great if you want 'crumbles' for a salad top, not so much if you want strips like 'normal' bacon.

    So we started pre-cooking it to about 90% done, and that keeps the strips as strips. I slice the slabs on a meat slicer (those on sheets in the middle, finished strips in front), then wife puts them on cookie sheets in the oven on broil until they cook enough, then we roll them in parchment paper and into jar to process (no liquid added).
    [​IMG]
    Used to pan fry them up in a big skillet outside, but they tend to turn a lot darker after a batch or two as the grease gets dark, so we switched to broiling in the oven and found that works best for us.

    [​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG]
     
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  9. T. Riley

    T. Riley Monkey+++

    @TnAndy do you still process the bacon for the same time as uncooked? Thanks for the advice and pics.
     
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  10. Zimmy

    Zimmy Wait, I'm not ready!

    I've only canned bacon. I fully cooked the meat. I then cooked the drippings until the water was out and poured them hot over the jarred bacon. No pressure cooking involved so what I really did was crocking in sealed Mason jars

    I've crocked pork boiled in lard.
     
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  11. TnAndy

    TnAndy Senior Member Founding Member

    Yes......60 min on pints, 90 on quarts. No liquid added, just roll in parchment and cram in the jar. Be SURE you wipe the jar rims good removing any grease from the packing, or you'll have a lot of seal failures.

    I show quart jars in the pics, but we do all pints now. I can get enough for 4 servings for us (2 each) in a pint jar. We'll open the jar, take out enough for one meal, then screw a wide mouth plastic lid on it and stick in the kitchen fridge freezer to be used next time.

    Wife has a piece of paper sign "Bacon Yes" or "Bacon No" she magnet flips/clips to the side of the fridge so we know if the leftovers from the last opened jar are in the freezer section w/o a lot of digging, or if we have to go out to the panty for a new jar.
     
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  12. TnAndy

    TnAndy Senior Member Founding Member

    Have friends who family practice is to cook sausage, pack in jars, pour excess grease over the contents and seal......but I'm sorta leery of that process personally, concerning about spoilage. Yeah, they did a lot of stuff like that 'in the olden days'.....but they suffered a fair amount of food poisoning too. We pressure can everything except fruit if packed with a heavy sugar syrup.
     
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  13. Zimmy

    Zimmy Wait, I'm not ready!

    Yep, it's an olden days family method but we never had food poisoning in crocking. The product was usually eaten within a few months.

    The bacon I canned was eaten over 6 months. Certainly not years in storage.
     
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  14. AxesAreBetter

    AxesAreBetter Monkey+++

    I hot can jerky when I make it. Only had 1 jar go bad in 3 years.
     
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  15. coloradohermit

    coloradohermit Monkey+++ Founding Member

    When I first started canning, I pressure canned quarts of water with the Ball blue book in hand, following each step in the process. Canning water may sound dumb, but you see the steps and what sealed jars look like. You can keep it in the emergency preps or open the jars and dump it. One of the major advantages of canning meat is that you can really buy up things that are on sale, like corned beefs around St Pat's day. Since we moved to a smaller house with less pantry, I'm using up meats canned as far back as 2010 with great results.
     
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  16. Ganado

    Ganado Monkey+++

    Rendered fat keeps the air out and the bacteria. It's fine if the layer of fat on the top is solid and doesn't melt.

    Storing in fat is only a medium to short term method of food storage and you have to throw the outside layer of the fat away. You can see the discoloration on the part that needs tossing

    I've only ever made duck confit this way because most of the fat for ducks are in their legs, it's yummy!

    What Is Duck Confit? - Food Republic

    for most salted or cured meat I don't see the point in canning. I can see precooked bacon canning as a convenience but the whole point of smoke and or salt preserved meat is to make it last in a cool house or cellar without cooking
     
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  17. SoaySheep

    SoaySheep Monkey

    The jars in the canner will rattle a bit and you have to use water filled jars (no lids) to balance everything out unless you are doing enough jars to fill the canner, If you don't have enough jars in there, they can tip over. Also add a good splash of white vinegar to the water in which the jars rest. It will prevent spalling
     
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  18. Navyair

    Navyair Monkey++

    That works. However, make sure you do a thorough inspection. Lots of stories out there on people who have fragged their kitches with those thrift store "finds."

    Better yet, look for sales. I bought my wife an electric pressure cooker for $45, new in box on one of the black Fri sales. She loves it, and it has a lot of safeties built in. She can can with it, brown, or cook a frozen roast in less than half an hour.
     
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  19. Dont

    Dont Just another old gray Jarhead Monkey

    Most area's have a county extension office and they can often test pressure canner's for you. Also, there is a difference between a pressure cooker and a pressure canner. One is used for cooking food without sealing in a container, the other, well seals it in a container as it is cooked, in the instance of raw packing or food may be cooked prior to packing and pressure sealing.

    Sorry if I am stating the obvious..
     
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  20. T. Riley

    T. Riley Monkey+++

    Made Chicken Salad with a pint of chicken I canned in July 2013, five and half years ago. Just perfect.
     
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