NewsAugust 5, 2016
Learn to can and enjoy the bounty of your garden all year long
When Marge Phillips first learned to can fresh produce, she was somewhere between 10 and 12 years old. Her family was a large one, and preserving fresh fruits and vegetables was a given. "That's just what my parents did," she says. Now, 50 years later, she is still canning things like fresh dill pickles, homemade salsa, green beans, and grapes for making grape juice -- anything that can be canned and not frozen, although she freezes vegetable such as corn, too...
When Marge Phillips first learned to can fresh produce, she was somewhere between 10 and 12 years old. Her family was a large one, and preserving fresh fruits and vegetables was a given.
"That's just what my parents did," she says.
Now, 50 years later, she is still canning things like fresh dill pickles, homemade salsa, green beans, and grapes for making grape juice -- anything that can be canned and not frozen, although she freezes vegetable such as corn, too.
"We try different things," she says.
Marge's husband, Rennie, a gardening columnist for The Southeast Missourian, grows all sorts of vegetables and fruits on their property in Scott City.
So when Marge is not at work, she helps Rennie harvest the fruits of his labor and preserve and store some items, while getting the rest ready for sale at area farmers markets. The surplus often is too large for only two people.
"Fifty quarts of this and 30 quarts of this -- it just depends on what we decided to can," she says.
Although Marge describes the process of canning different types of produce as hard work, it's still satisfying to see the finished products on her table.
"Gardening and canning take a lot of time, which is probably why a lot of people don't do it anymore," she says.
But since Rennie is retired, he can devote the time, and even has elaborate methods for growing cucumbers and tomatoes.
"I help him in the evenings and on the weekends," Marge says.
For anyone interested in learning to can food, Marge says it's important to have at least one good book on the subject for when questions arise. It's also advisable to take a course if one is available, she says.
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"It's a process of learning, but if you start out with the basics, you can expand your learning curve, try new things," she says.
For newbies, Marge recommends using a pressure canner, which helps ensure foods are canned at the correct temperature.
It's also important to use glass jars that are especially made for canning, as those that aren't can break. Also, don't try to use lids more than once -- only the rings that help secure the lids to the jars can be reused.
Bethany Bachmann, a nutrition and health education specialist at the University of Missouri's Extension office in Perryville, teaches classes on canning and answers questions whenever people call in with them.
She says the first thing any beginning canner should do is make sure he or she has a solid recipe, whether it's for making jam or something else. Resources for tested recipes include the U.S. Department of Agriculture at usda.gov, the National Center for Home Food Preservation at nchfp.uga.edu and Missouri's Extension website at extension.missouri.edu.
"Now, all the old recipes -- granny's methods -- aren't what they should be," Bachmann says.
Newer canning recipes are designed to prevent foodborne pathogens or bacteria from causing sicknesses that might have occurred when using techniques from earlier decades.
It's also important to make sure the correct equipment is readily at hand, such as a pressure canner or water bath canner, a funnel, jars and lids, a tong for picking up hot jars, a tool for measuring the amount of head space (space between the food and the jar lid) and a magnetic wand, which helps remove sterilized canning lids from boiling water.
Once all of that is in place, it's time to fire up the particular canner on hand.
If it's a pressure canner, it will be able to reach temperatures up to 250 degrees, and if it's a water bath canner, its maximum temperature is 215 degrees, she says.
From there, it's a matter of following the procedures gleaned from a credible book, such as the "Ball Blue Book of Canning and Preserving Recipes," or online resources like the ones mentioned above. If all else fails, Extension Service representatives like Bachmann can help answer questions and offer suggestions.
"With home preservation, you know exactly what's going into the jars," she says.
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