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You know, I quickly checked 'I taught myself', because I always just did what it said in my cookbooks, which had pretty good info. But now that I'm thinking about it, my 7th/8th grade homemaking classes (yes, I'm that old) including making grape jelly, canning peaches and tomatoes. We also made tomato soup out of the canned tomatoes. and popovers to eat the grape jelly on. I don't recall doing anything with the peaches.
One place where we lived had an old pear tree in the back yard. We got pears by the bushel. I used to can spiced pears for my dad...they were his favorite. Anything we couldn't use or give away before it fell and started to rot, we would take to our friends to feed to their pigs.
My grandmother and mother included me and my two brothers in the preserving process when we were kids. I think one of my brothers probably cans more than I ever have, but I do peaches and jams and pickles and I freeze the overrun from the garden.
My answer was my Mom who was my inspiration. However, to be honest the books should be in the answer too as they educate me on the specifics. Most of our large family does not can these days except one younger brother and myself. My brother does far more than I do.
I BUY it but I did participate in the process (unwillingly) as a child with my grandmothers and mother. It is a LOT of work, as I recall. But I admire those willing to do it.
You all don't know what you missed if you didn't spend all those summer hours in a hot kitchen - no air conditioning then - helping your mother can string beans, tomatoes and peaches or make preserves or pickles. LOL We sure did enjoy the fruits and vegetables of our labors, though.
Another frustrating question. I first learned to make jams and jellies from a relative, well a sort of relative, my grandfather's girlfriend. Then I extended my knowledge by reading. I could have chosen two items on the list, but only one is allowed.
I was taught by my Mother & Great Aunt and I taught my daughter while Homeschooling.
It included Math, History, Science, and Home Economics all in one.
whew - I'm late this am - it's what happens when you're on vacation and sleep in! lol
I first knew about canning from my dad, then when I went to my maternal g-parent's farm, I learned from my g-ma.
Then in Home Ec, I learned in Gr 7/8 (yes, I'M that old LOL)
Don't do much anymore, cuz I don't have my own fruit access, and buying from the stores in bulk is expensive. I used to can fruit & tomatoes.
Now I don't have the room to store it either - I live in a trailer, with a little bitty yard... ah well, One Of These Days (so I tell myself..)
My dear grandmother taught me a lot of what I know. Her favorite place in her home was her kitchen. That was my favorite place also. Because,always something yummy was in there with her.
My great grandmother who raised me taught me how to can. It has always seemed like a way of life to can and freeze whatever is available.
The year after my DH left the army and jobs were hard to find. I canned 100+ quarts of blackberrys. That winter we had blackberry jam,syrup,cobbler and anything else i could think up to supliment the few grocerys that we could buy.
This year i froze 5 qts of tomatoes. Both my DD,s can or freeze things also.
The French came up with the process of canning and i'm glad they did.
Hmmm, no "Other" to pick. I don't can, don't know how to can and don't accept home canned goods from friends and neighbors. I have entirely too high a regard for clostridium botulinium to feel comfortable with home canned goods. Sorry 'bout that.
My dear sweet mama was where I learned-like hart I spent many a hot day, picking or snipping beans, shelling peas, shucking corn, scrubbing cucumbers, running tomatoes through the food mill, peeling beets after their were scalded and so forth. I still can but not as much my mother. My nest is empty so we don't need so much either.
This question is a little amusing for me. Here's how I learned what (little) I know about preserving:
My sister who was just out of college (an English Lit major at Stanford, very high brow) and who had just snagged her first job as 'Managing Editor' of Ortho's paperback book "All About Canning and Preserving Foods" was called out of the blue by the organizers of the Illinois State Fair (very serious canning country, Illinois!) to come out to Springfield from San Francisco and do their Morning TV Talk Show and show how to make award winning jams and jellies and do another canning demonstration at the Fair that next week! Eeeeks! Sis was only 22 and didn't know a thing about canning really, only editing and writing, but her bosses insisted she had to 'sell' the book as part of her job (and they didn't want to go out to Illinois).
Soooo...we got busy in my kitchen with some Ball Jars and rings and a big boiler and parafin (what was that for? we had no idea!) and some exotic asian peaches from Chinatown, kumquats from our tree, and lots of sugar and trepidation and started making jam and trying not to burn ourselves or blow the jars up (we had always seen that in cartoons). And so we progressed and learned a little/enough from her book and then she set out for the airport with her books and 'supplies' and her TV 'script' and did her shows and demonstrations. And what do you know, the book became a best seller for Ortho, and Sis got promoted, and we have been blessed with some delicious preserves from our kitchens through the years.
Those were fun years living in San Francisco in the Seventies. Big years for Alice Waters and Chez Panisse, and preserving food from your own garden was all the rage.
By the way, I can't wait for the 'Julia & Julie' movie to come out!
I learned the art & science from my mother and grandmother, and look forward
to the time when my 20-something kids are ready to learn. I've pared down
my canning to tomatoes, spaghetti sauce, salsa, plain & spiced peaches, sweet
pickles, apple butter, and fruit preserves & jellies.
I learned from my mother. In return, I have taught my son, and am now teaching my granddaughter. She thinks it is fun helping now, but I want to wait and see if it becomes a life style for her. She is only 13, and I am afraid that canning and freezing will become a lost art in the next few years.
I started by thinking I was helping Mom. Had to stand on a chair to stir cake batters, roll our cookie dough and kneed bread.
One thing just lead to another.
Must have been the Lord's doing, as when I had barely turned 7 mom had to be hospitalized, for 3-1/2 to 4 months. I was the youngest and fixing the meals and taking care of the chickens was the job handed to me. My other brothers and sister were older and stronger, they got the fun jobs.
Outside of a couple times singeing my eyebrows, getting the old cast iron cook-stove fired up. I must have done alright. Nobody complained or died from my cooking. I butchered a couple chickens maybe every other day. Dad was a meat and potatoes kind of person. I was happy when the garden started to produce. I could sample what I was picking. It was a couple years later that mother introduced me to making jelly and the like. I was always too anxious to taste what I had helped can. Mother knew best as we still had fresh from the garden we could eat. I eventually grew up and was able to do guy things. Work in the field and such but the memory of cooking kind of stayed with me. My bride had not been introduced to canning. Was she ever in for a surprise, when we got to a place where we could garden.
I feel I have been truly blessed, I have been able to pass on some of those skills to some of our grand children. I am hoping for the chance to pass on some of that ability to some of the great grand children. Times have changed though. As far as 3 or 4 of the older ones know, eggs come in a cardboard box and bread only comes already wrapped. If only they could come and stay a week or so, it would give me the opportunity to bake bread for them and they could share in the pleasure of a slice of hot buttered bread just barley cool enough to cut. Oh well when they do come for a special thing or another, they at least get some of my homemade jam, and they don't know that most of the dinner fixins come from a mason jar, not a tin can.
Well maybe that job ought to be their Grandmothers. After all I did have a hand in helping them with a few of their baking skills.
And oh yes, they all know how to can and I too have picked up a new method or two. Yep from the great grand kids grand mothers.
Guess this old dog ain't too proud to learn a new trick or two.
LOL
Russ
Woofie, i really feel badly that you have such a low opinion of canning. The canners i know take very good care to avoid having spoiled food. Everything is cleaned and carefully sterlized and checked and rechecked for opened and unsealed lids. I'm much more concrned for commercial sterlization as such has been in the news of late.
I took college Microbiology and am well aware of the dangers of microbes. You will come across dangerous microbes everywhere you go in life. from everyones skin to hospitals.
If i know the canner i injoy food with the knowledge it is safer than anything i could buy.
Always remember heat to boiling for 10 minutes any foods you eat.
The only kind of food preserving I ever got into was pickling and that was for reasons of curiosity more than anything else. I learned I could make salt pickled cabbage with a big bowl, a plate, and a brick.
It tasted pretty good, once I washed all the salt off of it, LOL!
Oh, forgot to say, learned it from a book and modified it according to what I had on hand.
I've never preserved any foods, but in this economy, I'd desperately like to learn. i am attempting this year to grow my own veggies (second attempt, as the first summer attempt was a failure).
Same here...don't, but REALLY want to learn how.
We had our first garden last year...planted too late to really reap any benefits for canning/preserving.
This year's garden is kind of sparse...so I need to improve my gardening skills and my garden first (weeding, of course is my biggest downfall...never have time w/ 2 jobs/commute/kids!)
I'll have to plan better next year, and then plan some time to go along with the harvest!
My step dad taught my mom and me. We canned everything in tin cans, not glass except for jellies and jams.
Often our Christmas presents for other family members were cans of fish, strawberrys, blueberrys, mushrooms, etc. that we caught , picked or grew.
Only had a couple of cans explode and that was because we ran out of the proper can/lid combunations.
There were 3 different kinds, and each was designed for specific products - acids, bases, and neutral.
If you were going to use the product within a week, it was not a big concern, but after a couple of months the wrong combination of product & can would cause problems.
During harvest season, all three pressure cookers would be busy - smallest would hold 16 qts, biggest would hold 32.
My job was to crank the handle to seal the cans. Sure did not want to touch them when they came out of the pressure cooker - instant scald, so dad would pick one up wth thick leather gloves and set it on the base, I would slip on a lid and start the sealing process.
Still have the canner, but have not done any in many years. - mostly use the shrink wrapper and freeze things today.
I definitely am a 'none of the above' for this one. The thought of me doing this is very scarey what with potential explosions and food poisoning. I do LUV home preserved foods though so I trade for them and I do make up fresh things in those cute little preserving jars and give them away for immediate consumption.
I would love to learn how to can I grew up eating things my grandma canned. It was so great she made chowchow pickled peaches apricots you name it she canned it oh what memories this brings back to me.
Thanks
Greg
Zone 9
Fresno,CA
My sweet mom got me started when I was about 4 or 5. Helping in the garden and then bringing in all the produce. We made bread and butter pickles which made great gifts, pickled cabbage and I remember all those peas and green beans...snap, snap! What great memories. I think of her everytime I put something up.
I'm trying to keep the tradition going. My DD helps some so I'm hoping the older she gets the more she'll get the "canning/freezing bug"!
I kinda fudged on my answer. My husband is the cook in our family and does all the canning. Right now he's getting ready to can jelly plam perserves, from our pindo palm (Butia capitata). Nummy.
I really do need to learn how to do it though...
Barb
I picked the Internet as no one in my small family really gardens or cooks, so I had to learn about canning online.
I've only gotten into canning recently, making jams as my fruit trees start to bear as a way of sharing the bounty with family too far away to enjoy fresh fruit.
So far, so good. No food poisoning, no explosions,.
I've always admired the elderly women in my family that home canned, but they never taught it to me. Once I started trying to figure out what to do with the excess from my garden, I taught myself out of necessity from books. I also freeze produce; such as; okra, snowpeas, peppers, and fruit which was my mom's preference for preserving food. I mostly can jellies, pickles, peppers, relishes, and tomatoes. I made applebutter for the first time, and it disappeared so fast that I didn't get to keep any for myself. The favorite at the church bazaar is green tomato chow chow. I actually had to make more because we ran out. I''ve seen people eat my bread and butter pickles straight out of the jar like it was candy. This inspires me to continue home canning and to share it with others.
Wow! I'm so impressed with all the men who do the canning. I never dreamt that guys could do it, too. My dad was not familiar with the kitchen in any way, shape or form. (Except to work on plumbing.)
My mother was an excellent cook - but she wanted to do everything herself. She "wanted it done right". So I sort of learned to can by osmosis. (I have a degree in home ec. and don't remember any classes in food preservation.) I bought some good books, and have done most of it by the recipes and timing in the books. I used to can peaches and applesauce. But nobody in my family liked them. So that didn't save any time or money. I've finally come to the conclusion that I shouldn't make the effort to preserve it if nobody likes to eat it.
I made a little jelly last year and it still has not set up. Since I'm the only one who eats jelly I will spend my time and money getting to the grocery store for it. We froze some pesto last year. I have enough for this year in my freezer. And I still gave away basil by the garbage bag full. I'm taking a new approach to canning,"If we have too much to eat, I'm giving it away." We will dry the red chile pods - that's it. Nothing else will get preserved. My neighbors love me and my garden! = D
Anything of this sort will have to be self-taught. I don't have time to can but we do freeze the gardens bounty and I also use a food dehydrator (strictly for fruit leather lol).
Ditto, music keep,
Mom was always busy but Grandma taught all the grandchildren how to garden with flowers, veggies, etc. She wouldn't even let us eat a Pecos cantaloupe without saving the seeds.
Fig preserves were were the best in the world!
Good idea, Bubba.
My cousin sends lots of homemade jellies at Christmas time...last me until the next Christmas. I have used Currant Jelly on Pork Tender many times...
My MIL taught me, and I have since taught 2 young ladies who lived with us for a few years, and now am teaching my DIL who is a student nurse and doesn't have a lot of time, but she wants to buy a pressure canner now, so that is a good sign for the future.
My MIL, she kept a family well fed during tough times, always managed to make "drop in" guests feel welcome and well fed. She raised a large garden, canned meat, froze and canned vegetables, made jellies, jams, etc. The first meal I had at her house was the fourth of July, and we had fried chicken, onion rings, potato salad, home made rolls, and fruit pies. She didn't go to the store for day to day items. Coffee, tea, flour, spices, etc. were about all she bought much of the time.I have helped neighbors learn to can and to cook because of her inspiration!
My correct answer would have been a combination of my mother & close friends as well as book, TV, & the internet. But we are only allowed one answer(I think that should change) so I chose my mother's teaching. I learned to can & freeze as a teenager tho I was helping with the prep work long before that shelling out peas by the washtubfulls, pitting cherries, cutting up and destoning peaches and plums, etc. I learned dehydration methods after Mother was gone to live with JESUS. I still have 2 10 tray Miracle Aire dehydrators. Nothing to dehydrate this year except maybe some zukes others give me.
I first learned from my ex-husband's grandmother on her farm. We put up green beans and tomatoes every summer. Then I was divorced and years later married a man who loves to put up fruit from our trees. He makes jam, jelly and chutney, catsup and pickles. He has also dried fruit in a home-made fruit dryer. The guy hates to waste good food! He learned from his mother and from books. One year I made a lavender liquor that was quite interesting! It was best used medicinally in tea. We sometimes make preserved fruit in brandy and sugar that sits in a big crock; tutti fruiti, we call it. I believe it's a German traditional recipe. Very good with ice cream.
However, my inspiration has been both my grandmother and great grandmother long since both their passings. I am still enjoying the stories from my uncle about both my grandmother and great grandmother enlisting his aid as a boy. Most recently I enjoyed a story about my GG sending him to the cherry trees for fuit so she could make jam. These are stories that I will always treasure and I have started sharing these stories with my own children.
My mom always canned veggies, made pickles, chili sauce, marmalade. She would include my brother and I when we were younger. I have some idea of what work is involved, but have never attempted to do it myself. I prefer to buy it already made.
I really learned from multiple sources. My mother and mother-in-law taught me the hot water bath methods. My dear friend taught me how to make jams and jellies, and the rest of it I learned on my own reading pamphlets about freezing, etc.
Don't do as much anymore as I don't have time, but when the kids were little I did a good bit.
Oh, it was such fun finding this post when I was noodling around on DG site, today!! I still can and freeze (use my Seal A Meal vacuum thingy) even though I am alone now ...kids married and DH passed away. I learned from books and pamphlets from the cooperative Extension Service in Illinois ...they have a wealth of information! My kids are always anxious to get homemade stuff from Mum and I happily oblige. So far this year, I have only done bread and butter pickles, zucchini (shredded for the freezer to make Zucchini bread later); green beans from DD's garden. This weekend, I am going to my daughter's where she has a huge garden. We are going to make some carrot-orange marmalade, freeze some Swiss chard and more green beans. We make margaritas and have a great time together doing it!! By the time we are done, we have totally trashed the kitchen and are filthy and sticky ourselves!! LOL Making a great casserole of zucchini, Italian sausage, eggs and parmesan cheese today. The kids call me the casserole queen!! I hate to see a thing go to waste, also. I eat the beets (or can pickled ones) as well as the delicious beet green tops! I taught my DD and DIL both how to perserve food. My Mum used to do it, but I did not pay attention ...I just ate the finished product when I lived at home. We used to have black currant bushes and she made the best jam from them!!
Sandy
My mother used to can jams and jellies when I was little, so I have a rudimentary knowledge, but not enough to say I learned anything. Well, I take that back...I did learn not to make strawberry jam in a pressure cooker when I was about 5 years old! My mother tried to do this, but one of the strawberry bits lodged in the pressure release valve. Thank goodness our apartment had a door to the kitchen because when it finally exploded, boiling, sticky goo not only shot all over the ceiling, but in generally every direction imaginable! I dont think she ever attempted strawberry jam again!
Once we get our veggie garden installed and start growing things, I'm going to buy a pressure canner, which my neighbor tells is the greatest thing since sliced bread (she cans almost all of their food, everything from veggies to jams to soups, and has told me that her canning time has been cut by half per batch). Since I primarily eat natural and organic foods, learning how to can will end up saving us a small fortune!
Never have, never will use a pressure canner.
If it can't be processed in a hot water bath, I
don't do it. That's right, I'm a chicken bawk bawk
bawk :)
D.H. says any kind of acid, like vinegar or lemon juice keeps botulism from growing. It has to be a certain level of acidity but he thinks pickles and most fruit are acidic enough not to worry about. No illness here, yet. He is afraid to can vegetables because he doesn't feel skillful enough for that. Freezing vegetables works well.
I have that Ortho Book on preserving food. Also the one on Pickling. I learned to can from my mother. I got to peel peaches and tomatoes and to put thing things like pears into jars. My hands were the smallest. Over the years I have canned many things. Some of them only once. I love to make jams and jellies but never eat them. So I have stopped. Will only eat my own pickle relish. I found a great recipe in an old Kerr book. I added turmeric to it and it was terrific. Now I have found that berries are the best if frozen in glass jars. Just washed and put in the jars with or without sugar and frozen. Flavor is much better
Napergal, the Alabama extension service pamphlets were exactly the ones I used to learn many things. My mother gave me one when I got married. Guess she didn't want me to steal hers! I've never used a pressure canner either. A friend had a similar explosion cooking a chicken in hers. A small piece of chicken or skin apparently got up in her vent. She spent hours cleaning chicken off every surface of her kitchen. Haven't wanted to use one since.
All of us have heard pressure cooker stories, but most of us still use one. We've all heard stories of car wrecks too, but most of us still drive or ride in one of those.
When used according to mfgr's directions, pressure cookers are safe, but people cook the wrong types of foods in them, or fill them too full, the vents plug up and pressure blows the rubber safety plug. Another cause is letting the pressure get too high because we turn it on and go to do something, "just for a minute" and forget to watch it.
My mother decorated the kitchen making barley soup in one. She said it was filled too full, and she didn't consider how much the barley would expand. I don't think the canning size was available at that time, but she wasn't into canning anyhow. She just had a small one for making dinner in a hurry after work, and she continued to use it for many years after the barley soup incident.
I don't really know what the difference is between a pressure cooker and a pressure canner since I don't have either, but the pressure canners seem pretty useful from what I've read online when trying to research brands. I did buy a book on small batch canning that has a ton of great info and recipies, but I've yet to do anything with it besides read it.
Great question, Emma75! There are a couple of differences between pressure canners and pressure cookers. They both use high pressure inside a pan to increase the temperatures so food can cook faster. The pressure cookers generally have only one pressure regulator and always cook at 15 pounds. A pressure canner has a pressure regulator than can be set for 5, 10, or 15 pounds. Also the canner is generally a larger pan. I have used my pressure canner to cook large amounts of food, just as I would cook in my little pressure cooker.
Acidic foods (like tomatoes) can be canned without a pressure canner. However, non-acidic foods like corn or beans must always be canned in a pressure canner (which is capable of heating to higher temp. Botulism is a bacteria that only grows in an atmosphere without oxygen. But it's killed by longer higher cooking temps. It occurs naturally in the ground. It's possible that botulism stays alive in honey, so honey should never be given to babies. Actually the toxin produced by the bacteria is lethal. It's not the bacteria itself. Short, short summary of canning. : D
At high altitudes the pressure cooker really saves time. I don't know that I'd use one if I lived at sea level. We have had one for many years and love to use it for beans.
Gavafriend, that is fantastic info ~ thank you so much for explaining the difference so simply! Since I'm vegetarian, I've never seen the point of having a pressure cooker because I remember my mother primarily using hers to make goulash and such, but part of the reason I havne't bothered canning is that I don't want to bother with boiling jars in my stock pot all day
My neighbor is diabetic, so she cans enough food to make it through a long spell without electricity in case of a hurricane since she has to be on such a strict diet. She's been canning about 40 years, so I took her word as golden when it came to her review of the presure canner she bought a couple of years ago. She swears it's a must when you live in a steamy place like Florida, and can reduce the amount of time a boiling pot of water is sitting on the stove when the temp and humidity are both hovering around 100!
All of my DM's family and DSM's families preserved and grew fruit and produce. My earliest memories were of my aunt and DSM stoking the wood stove to heat it up for canning jars of berries, peaches, pears and vegetables. Both had big Presto pressure cookers which had adjustable "jigglers" on the vent for 5-10 or 15 lbs of pressure. Nothing went to waste. When we were big enough to run around like wild Indians in the summer time, my cousins and I might raid the cellar for a jar of peaches, or pickled crab apples for a snack We learned early on that food was the result of hard work, we picked peas, beans, berries, carrots, corn, wild blackberries and strawberries, and learned to clean and prep them for eating or canning.
I still make a variety of jams every year, (Would everyone PLEASE give me back my empty jars???) but I mostly freeze and vacuum seal everything else. We have two upright freezers, and I'm cleaning them out now to make room for some nice organic beef. I'll have tomatoes and sugar snaps later, the snaps are just coming up now, and the swiss chard is already done for. We're eating green beans as fast as the plants produce them, and I've already harvested our first new potatoes.
I don't think there is anything as beautiful as a counter full of fresh home grown produce.
My great aunt India taught me to can. We did everything as she had tons of fruit trees and a big truck garden...still not sure why she called it that. grin She had a canning room off the coal shed with a huge sink and stove and shelves that ran floor to ceiling on three sides. She also raised chickens and we made the sauce for chicken and dumplings also.Chow chow, pickle-lillie, pickles, relish, beans of every kind, beets, tomatoes and jams and jellies. She started her family during the Depression, and used to say it was the best teacher a young housewife could ever have.
All self taught, and learned from different cookbooks. loved canning tomatoes, would do half a bushel in the afternoon, disliked canning peaches because there was so much prepping to do. Did a good bit of freezing also, peppers, cauliflower, etc., you name it and it was either canned or frozen. One year I put up just under or over 400 jars of canned food. Plus all the frozen foods I froze. I really miss the chunks of rhubarb that I always had in the freezer. In the dead of Winter I would bake an upside down rhubarb cake for the children to eat, warm, with glass of milk, as soon as they walked in the door from school. They always loved it!
And to this day I cannot get use to buying canned tomatoes because they are NOT the same as my home canned.
And yes, I used the large pressure cooker, which I sold and wish I hadn't.
Anymore I am too old, the children are grown and live far away - no need for all that food.
Just many happy memories!
