Any unconventional canners out there?

[old fashioned]

Aight, now I have a question for the diehard water bathers
We bought 40#'s of potatoes when we were in montana cause it was a wonderfully good deal and they are actual idaho potatoes I'm thinking we need to can some of them so we have them instead of letting them go to waste. Do we just follow the directions for them that the ball book has for the pressure canner and just apply it to the water bath? should we double the time for the water bath? hmmm, questions! answers?

I've not done potatoes before but have thought about trying it. My concern is less about acidity & more about starch content & how solid/dense they are.

Disclaimer:I am not in anyway trying to convince anyone inexperienced in w/b canning of veggies, meats, etc. that would pose any risks of potentially harmful effects. This thread is intended for those who are experienced w/b canners to share ideas, recipes, etc

Now, that being said.....WHEN I do try potatoes (ya know I'm gonna sooner or later ) I'd probably cut them into bite size pieces to ensure they were heated thru but not cooked before putting them in a jar & process them for a bit longer & only use pints or 1/2 pints. I would think using quarts the potatoes would end up too over cooked by the time processing was done.
Or possibly mix cut taters with other veggies for soup, stew, etc

Others may have other ideas that have already done taters



As for the mushrooms I did over a month ago...ahhh....what shrooms?..... We've already used all I canned & WANT MORE. This experiment worked great & the only thing I'd do differently in future is to boil them BEFORE measuring (I didn't take shrinkage into account at the time) I will definately do shrooms again.
That goes double for the marinated mushroom recipe above. Having revived this thread reminded me that it was about time to try them. So I did & they tasted ggrrrrreat!!!
THANK YOU SUFFICIENTFORME


Now if only the store would have them on sale again (when I have enough $$ :/ )......I'll be doing alot more of each.

 

[dipence71]

"Disclaimer:I am not in anyway trying to convince anyone inexperienced in w/b canning of veggies, meats, etc. that would pose any risks of potentially harmful effects. This thread is intended for those who are experienced w/b canners to share ideas, recipes, etc"

Exactly!!!
I have a pressure canner but hate it so I use it as a waterbath and just dont seal the lid.

I will definitely be buying a steam canner
thanks to bee's recommendations and the less water time ect of using this.

I water bathed spaghetti sauce with deer meat and some plain ground deer burger and it was awesome.

 

[old fashioned]

I've done speghetti sauce too but used hamburger & italian sausage in it & was great tasting & a great time saver for dinner ideas.
I haven't done any this year YET since my tomato harvest didn't go as planned.....they never did get ripe & lost the whole bunch So I'll have to buy the maters for canning (that sucks) & I'm hoping the store will have Roma's on sale here soon so I can get that out of the way.

I've also done chicken & beef broth to use for soups, gravies, etc (so take THAT Swanson )

I too am very interested in trying out the steam canner but may have to wait until next year...maybe I'll put that on my christmas wish list

 

[dipence71]

We didn't get a single tomato this yr either. But I do make my own spaghetti sauce even if I have to use "store bought" or farmers market(preferably) stuff.
As well as I make my own zucchini tomato salsa and we eat allot of it so I canned like 30 quarts, yes quarts, of salsa. My zucc didn't grow well either so I had to shop at farmers market.

The steam canner is also on my Christmas list lol. Along with a new food processor as I tore min up this year lol. I was thinking about the kitcheaide attachment but not sure how versatile it is.