David surprised me last week with an early Mother's Day present -- and it is SO awesome!! It's a 23-quart pressure canner and canning kit, which means that I can can (OK, I should probably find a better way to write that since it sounds funny!) all kinds of things! A few years ago I canned apricot preserves using a boiling water method, and I was pleased with the results but it was hard since I didn't have any canning racks or special equipment. Also, lots of foods aren't acidic enough to be canned using the water method (since water only gets up to 212 degrees F, and botulism bacteria can survive at that temperature in low-acid foods). A pressure canner, however, gets the temp up to 242 degrees, I think, so botulism is totally obliterated and you don't have to rely on the acidity of the food being canned to ensure food safety. So now I can preserve a ton of stuff that I plan to make once I harvest my garden: tomatoes, spaghetti sauce, salsa, pumpkin, pumpkin butter. And I'd love to make up a bunch of apple butter when apples are in season this fall. I'm so excited!
2 comments:
That is an awesome gift!! Way to go David!
And I can't wait to try some of the preserved goodies :)
That is so cool. I hope that I can watch and learn from you, or maybe just help you. It would be fun to work with you on something like canning. If we have a plethora of fruits we can bring some to you (although we seem to have some nasty critters around this year). Enjoy your new toy!
We love you so much!
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