Having a pout- I can't can what I want to. Hmf! Or can I? Help!

[moolie]

Here's what I want to can:

My son's FAVORITE soup, (the biggest canning let-down) is Chicken corn chowder with bacon (can't because of the milk, and it's even worse if I add potatoes)
Italian bean soup (the beans-will disintegrate I've read several places?)
Chili with mean and beans
Any soup with noodles, barley, potatoes, rice or beans, which is basically all my favorite recipes for soup.

Can your chicken corn chowder without the milk, the potatoes will be fine. Can it at the correct pressure for your altitude, for the processing time for the ingredient that needs the longest processing time (the chicken, which would be 75 minutes/pints 90 minutes/quarts). Add the milk when you open the jar and cook it. I like half and half in mine

The beans will not disintegrate, I can beans all the time--I recently posted a "how-to" in the What Are You Canning Today thread. Soak your beans over night. Make your soup, then add the beans just to get them hot. Can the soup, again using the correct pressure for your altitude and the processing time for the ingredient that needs the longest processing time

I've canned chili with meat and beans and it works great, but you need experience canning beans first to know how much saucy "space" to leave for bean expansion. For ease, especially as you are getting into pressure canning, can the chili without beans and can beans in separate batches. Open two jars, mix together, and enjoy.

Ditto all the above posts about noodles and rice--they WILL disintegrate, add them when you heat the soup. But barley, potatoes, and beans can just fine--check the manual that comes with your canner

 

[moolie]

Canning fatty food is fine, you just run the risk of it getting between the seal and the jar, which is not a problem if you leave appropriate head space and ensure the top rim of the jar is super clean

I can meat all the time also, along with various soups/stews/chilis etc.

I've even been known to toss a knob of butter into a particularly frothy jam to kill the foam, and no one around here has died yet

 

[luvinlife offthegrid]

Thanks, moolie. How much room do you usually leave between the solids and the top of the liquids (below the head space) when canning beans and chili with beans? Does it depend on the ratio of beans to meat?

I will try to find the non-quick barley. I will try the corn chowder. I also have a jar funnel, and am pretty good at keeping the edge clean.

The canning with fat stuff applied mostly to canning things like pesto or basil in oil.

 

[luvinlife offthegrid]

Hm... I have to figure out squash soup too. I made a darn good squash soup.

 

[baymule]

The pressure cooker I bought many years ago came with a guide for canning times and some recipes. Take the plunge, we will help you! I bought the kind with the dial gauge, wish I had bought the one with the weighted ( 5, 10, 15 ) pound caps instead.

 

[luvinlife offthegrid]

Thanks, baymule!

 

[moolie]

Thanks, moolie. How much room do you usually leave between the solids and the top of the liquids (below the head space) when canning beans and chili with beans? Does it depend on the ratio of beans to meat?

I will try to find the non-quick barley. I will try the corn chowder. I also have a jar funnel, and am pretty good at keeping the edge clean.

The canning with fat stuff applied mostly to canning things like pesto or basil in oil.

For beans, I fill the jar 2/3 full of beans then add water or "baked bean" sauce. For chili it's a little more dicey, but you can start by filling the jar 1/3 full of meat, 1/3 full of beans, and the final 1/3 the "saucy" part of the chili. As you get into it you can tweak it a little more.

Yeah, I wouldn't can pesto or anything in oil... too much possibility for all kinds of disaster even beyond food poisoning, you could blow up a few jars etc.

 

[~gd]

Think a minute A lot of the ingredients used in soup can be canned but there are catches. The noodles in Chicken Noodle soup are not the same as you buy in the supermarket. They are special formulations made to stand up to the longer cooking times [would you want to have to cook noodles 75 minutes in a pressure cooker for everyday use?] Commercial canners seldom use water as the heat exchange medium in their pressure units live superheated steam under pressure works so much better but a home use unit would be too costly.
The 'cream' in cream of whatever soup is usually more of a modified starch than anything that ever came from a cow. Convient and unprocessed are opposites when speaking of food.
Frankly when I am not starting from fresh. most of my ingriedents are dehydrated. I find them much more handy than canned. Individually flash frozen are good too if ypu can get them home without them partly thawing.
Leftover soup is on my table about once a week when I clean out the refrigerator.~gd

 

[luvinlife offthegrid]

I know what you mean, ~gd. Once I read that milk and their products separate, the proverbial lightbulb lit up in my brain and I realized just how processed canned stuff is. Anything to do with "cream of" or with "cheese" in it, must be a chemical mess. I already knew that the stuff wasn't anything like I cook at home, but I guess I now have a more practical knowledge of how far removed it is from anything I'm familiar with. . It seems like the canned items that are easier to make at home (jams, jellies, pickles) are easier to find closer to what homemade would be on the shelf at the store.

I simply had no practical knowledge of pressure canning, but I'm very familiar with water bath.

 

[moolie]

It's knowing the rules, and the limitations, that opens something like canning right up

Once you get the hang of it, you'll keep coming up with things you want to can. We have a pretty amazing pantry of food we can pop a lid off and chow down on at this point.