Food Preservation Basics - Part 2

Host: Mindy McCulley, Extension Specialist for Instructional Support, Family and Consumer Sciences Extension, University of Kentucky

Guest: Annhall Norris, Extension Associate for Food and Nutrition

0:00 Welcome to Talking FACS; what you need to know about family, food, finance and fitness. Hosted by the University of Kentucky Family and Consumer Sciences Extension Program, our educators share research knowledge with individuals, families and communities to improve quality of life.

Welcome back to this special edition of Talking FACS where we're going to talk all about food preservation and canning again with our special guest, Annhall Norris, who is our extension associate for food safety.

I'm Mindy McCulley, your host and I'm the Extension Specialist for Instructional Support with the Family and Consumer Sciences at the University of Kentucky. Thanks for joining me, Annhall.

0:44 Annhall Norris: Hey, Mindy.

0:45 Mindy McCulley: All right. So, we talked a little bit at the last time about the difference between boiling water bath canners and pressure canners. And we talked a little bit about tomatoes and pickles.

But now let's move into another favorite product that people now have coming in their gardens which is green beans.

1:07 Annhall Norris: Yes. Mine are family coming in. Mine are a little bit slower this year; I had my cucumbers in first. And I want to remind everyone that our green beans are a vegetable and they have to go in a pressure canner. So, whenever I talk about gaining green beans, just know that we're talking about a pressure canner.

1:23 Mindy McCulley: Good. Okay. So, are there special beans that work better for canning than others or should we all use our snap beans?

1:32 Annhall Norris: No, you can use your waxy beans and even French-Style green beans; I get that question a lot. Because if you're using tested recipes from your BALL book or the USDA site, they don't really put French-Style green beans in there. And you can get a French-Style green beans, just like your snap beans or your waxy beans; you use the same times.

French-Style green beans are going to be a little bit more tender to begin with and you probably could process them a little bit less but no one has told us that. So, we use the standard time for snap beans and waxy beans as printed in the BALL book for our French-Style green beans.

2:12 Mindy McCulley: We just want to be safe and that little bit of extra time helps ensure that safety; doesn't it?

2:18 Annhall Norris: Right. And I actually bought some of those beans at the market last year; I don't grow those. And mine didn't turn out mushy. I was a little worried that since they were so tender to begin with, that processing them for that length of time in the pressure canner would turn them into mush, but they didn't; they were perfect.

2:34 Mindy McCulley: That was good to know; right?

2:35 Annhall Norris: Yeah.

2:36 Mindy McCulley: So, this is kind of a related question that goes along the same lines, but when you're ready to eat those preserved vegetables, do you have to boil them for 10 minutes once they come out of the jar or can you eat them straight out of the jar?

2:48 Annhall Norris: Well, USDA has recommended, just as an added safety precaution, to boil your pressure came vegetables for 10 minutes or so. And I will tell people from UK Extension, our extension agents will tell people, “If you have canned them at home and you followed a tested recipe and you know that your dial gauge is accurate, then you should be fine eating them right out of the jar; you don't need to boil them.” That is if you've done everything correctly and your dial gauge is working fine, you don't need to boil them.

3:21 Mindy McCulley: So, you said, “If you know your dial gauge is accurate…” How do we know that our dial gauge is accurate?

3:28 Annhall Norris: Well, if you're using a dial gauge canner, you should have it tested once a year and you every extension office in the state has a tester. You can take your lid in and they can put your lid right on that tester. They'll pump it up and they'll see what the calibrated gauge is reading and they'll tell you what your gauge is reading. They do it right there in front of you; you can see it.

And if your dial gauge is off by more than two pounds, either way; higher or lower, you need to either get a new one or send it off and have it recalibrated.

4:00 Mindy McCulley: So what would make a pressure gauge lose its calibration?

4:05 Annhall Norris: Oh, excellent. I meant to bring that up. So, if you drop the lid (and I've done that before; they are heavy) or if you hit it on something hard or if you're just going to put it away and you knock that dial gauge against something, it can make it be off either way.

So, it is important to test it at the beginning of a canning season; that way, you know going in. And I would recommend testing it a month or so before because if you do need to send it off, it might take several weeks to get it back.

4:32 Annhall Norris: And perhaps, if you do have one of those experiences where you drop the lid in the middle of canning, you probably want to go have it tested again; right?

4:40 Annhall Norris: Yes. And there isn't a fee for that. You just need to make sure that the agent is there or someone who knows how to operate the tester can do that for you.

4:48 Mindy McCulley: Sounds great. We have so many great resources at our extension offices though.

4:53 Annhall Norris: Oh yes; we do.

4:54 Mindy McCulley: So, we have another safety question. Can I just use my leftover pickle jars or mayonnaise jars from the grocery store to can my produce?

5:03 Annhall Norris: No no. You don't want to do that. I'll start with the pickle jar as most people wanted to use that pickle jar again.

And the reason you can't use that is the rim of that pickle jar accepts a special type of lid and that is not the same two-piece lid that you buy to can in. So, the lids are not going to fit those pickle jars; you can't reuse those.

The mayonnaise jar is a little bit different. If you can find mayonnaise in a glass jar right now, that glass jar was not made the same way that a caning jar was made.

So, when a manufacturer makes a canning jar, the glass is heated and cooled at a very specific time and temperature and it takes several hours to do that. That's called tampering. And it makes that glass really strong, so you can use it over and over and over again, as long as it isn't nicked or scratched.

The mayonnaise jars don't go through that same process. So, if you put your cucumbers and everything in that jar to make pickles in that mayonnaise jar, it's probably going to break the first time and if not the first time, it'll break the second time. It just can't stand that heat.

6:09 Mindy McCulley: And you don't want to take that risk of having glass in your food.

6:13 Annhall Norris: Oh no. Or even cleaning up that mess. That's not anything either.

6:16 Mindy McCulley: Yeah, the mess would be a harm.

6:18 Annhall Norris: Yes.

6:19 Mindy McCulley: Okay. So, you mentioned that we don't want to have any nicks or scratches or cuts in our jars, so we need to check those before each session?

6:30 Annhall Norris: Yes. You want to visually look at those, hold them up to the light, see if there's any nicks or scratches. And then I usually very carefully run my finger over the top to see if there's any rough spots on there.

6:40 Mindy McCulley: Very good. So, that will impede our good processing. If we don't do that; right?

6:47 Annhall Norris: That's right. And since we're talking about that, I want to make sure that everyone knows you don't want to reuse your flat lids either. Each time you can, you need to get a new flat lid because the underside of that lid is coated with a special rubbery-like material; it's called a plastisol and that's just good for one use.

Once it's sealed on there, the invention is permanent and so you can't use it again; it won't seal the next time you use it.

7:16 Mindy McCulley: So, you can use the rings, you just can't use the flat lids.

7:20 Annhall Norris: Right. You can reuse the jars the glass jars and the rings, but not the flat lids.

7:25 Mindy McCulley: OK. Very good. So, do I have to add salt when I'm canning green beans, tomatoes, corn or any of the other produce?

7:33 Annhall Norris: No, you don't. Salt is just a flavoring agent when it comes to canning; that's not actually what preserved the product. It's the temperature that preserves it.

So, if you're on a reduced sodium diet or no-sodium diet, you don't need to put salt in any of those recipes. Unless it's a pickle recipe, you do want to make sure you're following the pickle recipe exactly. But as far as your vegetables, you don't need to add any salt when canning.

8:00 Mindy McCulley: Perfect. Adding salt adds flavor, but does it cause any other changes in the liquid or the product?

8:08 Annhall Norris: Oh yes. I'm glad you brought that up. If you do want to add salt when you're caning, you want to make sure that you're adding a salt that was made for pickling or canning. And it'll say that on the label. You don't want to just add your table salt.

Table salt has an extra additive to keep it from sticking together; it's not so much a preservative, but just an agent to keeping it free flowing, so it flows out of the shaker. And that extra agent will cause cloudiness when you use it to can.

So, if you've ever seen a can of green beans and the liquid looks a little bit cloudy, it's probably because they use table salt instead of salt that was specifically made for canning.

8:48 Mindy McCulley: Okay. So, it's not necessarily that that is a bad can, it's just that they might have used the wrong salt; right?

8:56 Mindy McCulley: Yes. That's probably what it is. So, if I had a can of cloudy green beans, I would first take the ring off and see if the seal is intact. If the jar is still sealed and I don't see any bubbles in the product or maybe anything floating on the top, then you can pretty much figure it was the salt that was in there.

But if you go to check that seal and the jar isn't sealed, then there's another issue; it’s probably bacterial growth and I would just throw it away.

9:25 Mindy McCulley: We don't want to take that risk; right?

9:27 Annhall Norris: Yeah.

9:28 Mindy McCulley: Okay. So, one more question. Can I use my flattop range for canning with my boiling water bath canner or my pressure…?

9:39 Annhall Norris: Well, that depends. If you know that your glass top stove allows canning, then you can. You need to check the manufacturer's directions that come with the stove.

You don't want that burner to cycle off and on. And a lot of those flattop stoves have burners that once they reach a certain temperature, they cut themselves off. And you need to have a constant temperature in your boiling water bath canner and your pressure canner in order to maintain a constant temperature or a constant pressure.

So, if the unit doesn't cycle off, then you can use that stove for canning. And then you also need to make sure that your canner has a flat bottom. A lot of the {indistinct 10:22} containers that you get (the boiling water bath canners) they have a kind of a ridged bottom and those don't work well on the flattop stove.

10:31 Mindy McCulley: Okay. And probably, if you use a flattop stove at all, you know it cycles on or off because you see that light.

10:39 Annhall Norris: You've seen it right. Yeah, you would know that.

10:42 Mindy McCulley: So, then, let me ask about induction tops. Have you had an experience camping with those?

10:48 Annhall Norris: I was at an extension office where they were trying one of those. And those are a little bit different. They do provide a constant heat source and they're fast; that was nice.

But you have to have special cookware. You can't just put your regular canner on there. The cookware has to be magnetic. So, if you can get a magnet to stick to the pot that you're going to can in, you can use it. Otherwise, you have to purchase special pots and canners to go on those type of burners. And those can get expensive.

11:19 Mindy McCulley: Right. Because you need that magnetism to conduct the heat.

11:23 Annhall Norris: To conduct the heat. That's right.

11:25 Mindy McCulley: All right. So, if you have a smooth top surface and you know that it cycles on and off, can you use your burner on your gas grill out on the deck to do your canning?

11:37 Annhall Norris: Yes, you can. Or if you have a turkey cooker, you know one of those units, you can do that. I've actually done that. I had to do it last year. We were without air conditioning.

And the first time, it went beautifully and the second time, it was a little more windy and I couldn't keep my flame lit. And so, the second time was not very successful.

But yes, that is an option to can outside. And a lot of people will do that for that very reason. If the kitchen isn't air conditioned, they want to do all that hot cooking outside.

12:07 Mindy McCulley: Oh, it sounds like a great idea to me. And maybe not quite so much clean up if you don't have a lot in the kitchen.

12:12 Annhall Norris: That's right.

12:14 Mindy McCulley: Well, thanks for joining me, Annhall, I think we've had a really great discussion about how we can use all this great bounty from our garden.

12:21 Annhall Norris: Okay great. Thanks.

12:22 Mindy McCulley: Thank you.

12:24 Thank you for listening to Talking FACS. We deliver programs focusing on nutrition, health, resource management, family development and civic engagement.

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