What's your favorite and why?

[Anon001]

Okay.... just curious. What is your favorite method of preservation: canning, freezing, dehydrating? .... and why?

Personally, I prefer canning for three reasons.

1. I just never have dried much,
2. I have little freezer space and don't want the cost of adding a propane freezer (off-grid). I think canning is cheaper than paying to run a freezer for a year.
3. I think the canned foods have a better taste than frozen, especially after they sit in the brine, vinegar, etc and have time to "flavor".

[Thyme]

For me its canning. I do dry a lot of items,but canning at nite when the kids are in bed is relaxing. When hubby gets home from work in the morning & the counter is covered with hot sealed jars there is a sense of accomplicment(sp). Canning for us as we get bird spit for rain & tiny wind gust & the power goes out for hours. Just heat & eat on grill or fireplace.I do freeze alot of meat & then can it when I have the extra time.Peas I always freeze thats the only way I like them & they must be tiny peas.With freezing I lose to many items in there the freezer is disorganized (kids rooting). Where my pantry is very organized.

[Mom5farmboys]

I like canning best also, for all of the reasons that were stated already. The only other reason I can think to add is the shelf life is so much longer in a jar than in a freezer. If you don't use everything up in a year, the stuff you canned is still just as good as when you put it up, but most everything thats been in a freezer for a year would be freezerburned.

[firegirl969]

Definitely canning! I hate to lose items in the freezer due to freezer burn. I also like to look at my jars lined up on the shelves. It is very rewarding.

[NCLee]

Mine is canning, too.

In no particular order.....

(1) No worry when the power goes out from hurricanes or ice storms.
(2) No freezer burn / off flavors of meats in the freezer for more than a few months.
(3) Extended shelf life.
(4) No defrosting before use. Heat & eat.
(5) No additional on-going cost to store canned goods.
(6) Better flavor - I don't like frozen green beans and frozen chicken.

All that said, I do prefer freezing some things, such as corn on the cob and baby lima/butter beans. Like to make big pots of veggie soup for supper with the intent of freezing the leftovers. I can't make a good small pot of soup. Plus there are a number of things that can't be preserved or stored any other way --- ice cream!, meats to be grilled or fried (fish!). And, the freezer will hold many things at their prime before transferring to a canning jar.

Used to do a lot of dehydrating, but got away from it for some reason. Dusted off the dehydrator, pulled out the books/recipes and firing it up again. Looking forward to making some pumpkin bark from some pie pumpkins, soon. http://www.backpackingchef.com/pumpkin-pie-bark.html

Lee

[AlchemyAcres]

What is your favorite method of preservation: canning, freezing, dehydrating?


It depends on the intended use, I don't really have a prevailing favorite, they all have their pluses and minuses.

Tomatoes as example....
I can a good part of my tomatoes....dry some
Principe Borghese or the like....I also dry smoked tomatoes and tomato 'filets' from Romeo or Opalka...I can some tomato paste, but put up a good bit in the freezer, frozen in ice cube trays and then popped out and stored in vacuum bags....also ferment some tomatoes and store them, temporarily, in the fridge.....keep some 'high acid' varieties in fresh preservation until around Christmas, most years....

Kinda the same with Peppers....
I can some..pickle some....dry some....smoke and dry some, ala Chipotle....candy some and again ferment some.

Pickled horseradish is good for many things but sucks for sauces....i dry and powder horseradish for sauce because it incorporates better, and pickled horseradish isn't compatible with many recipes.

I dry and usually grind some sweet corn...can some and sometimes freeze some....depends on the final use...

Cabbage gets pickled, dried or stored in the 'root' cellar.....

and on and on.....

And no, I don't do it all every year! LOL


~Martin ;)

[kiwirach]

at the moment, i would have to say freezing....primarily because i dont know how to do anything else. however as i move towards my goal i am going to have to learn other ways of preserving in order to survive adequately.
the one thing i struggle with as i read all about canning stuff, is the canning of meat. since i dont eat meat out of a supermarket tin now, i dont know what canned meat tastes like, and tbh, it sounds horrible :secret:
hopefully it will be proved otherwise!!.

[NCLee]

Kiwirach, since you're across the pond, I don't know if your grocery store canned meats differ from ours. However, I suspect they are much the same, with the exception of regional specialities.

That said, IMHO, there's a world of difference between commercial canned food and home canned.

One big differnce is the amount of salt used. Here most commercially canned meats are very high in sodium content. When home canning meats the salt can be left out completely. Thus, the meat can be properly seasoned at the time of use.

Another difference is the quality of the meat used. While I can't say this about all commercially canned meat products, generally the poorer cuts go into cans. With beef, the best grade "prime" and the best cuts go to the resturants. Supermarkets get "choice" and "select", with "standard" going into the cans. These are general statements because there are exceptions.

Home canned meats don't have a long list of additives, preservatives, and enhancers added to the jars. Simply canned meats only have the meat, water or broth, and perhaps a bit of salt for seasoning. Some meat canning processes don't add anything except the meat to the jars.

There's a second part to this. If you don't like home cooked beef stew, chicken and dumplings, fish stew, chances are you won't like canned meats. There's no way to get around the difference in texture between a chicken drumstick that's been roasted or fried and one that's been canned. However, I like chicken is all forms of cooking, including a good chicken pot pie that has meat from a drumstick. (Pot pie = chicken and vegetables baked in a pastry crust. (Savory, not sweet.) If you like homemade stews and similar dishes, you will like the results when you make them using home canned meats.

Finally, as this post is getting long, canning meats is only a portion of canning. There's the whole world of fruits and vegetables waiting for you, even if you never can a piece of meat. For many, canning meat is secondary to canning veggies and fruits. Can't speak for everyone, but in my case, canning meat is a small percentage of what I can.

I've never thought about it from that standpoint before. So, I'm guessing the percentage of meat that I can is roughly 5% to 15% of what I can in total. The vast majority of what I can is vegetables, followed by fruits. Over the years I'm sure I've canned more tomatoes and greenbeans than anything else.

Even if you choose only one product type to can, such as fruit, there's so much you can do to make learning the craft worthwhile. For example: apples. Can apple slices plain in a simple syrup. Can apple pie filling. Make applesauce and apple jelly. Or, focus on pickles - it probably could take a lifetime to explore all the possibilities involved with many types of pickle.

Hoping this long post will help you to take the next step needed for you to get started putting something, of your choice, into jars. I'm sure you'll be rewarded not only with good eats, but with a great sense of accomplishment, self-satisifaction, and independence.

Lee

[Anon001]

Kiwirach,

Canned meat is great. I had never had canned meat until I heard an old man talking about it one day. He said, "What I wouldn't give to have some of mama's canned meat." He was referring to beef. It's great for any meal...... take the cubed beef out of the jar with it's own gravy that it's been savoring in for a few months, pour it over some hot buttered biscuits... oh my.... It is sooooo good. It is even beats chili on a cold winter night as my favorite.

Give it a try. Canned meat, vegetables, fruits are all very tasty. Home canning gives your food a new taste with the way all the flavors meld together over a few weeks or months in a sealed jar, unlike anything else.

[kiwirach]

Lee and Paul, thanks for your views and info on canned meat. Lee your point about the texture of the canned meat was very helpful....i hadn't thought about that side of things. Thankfully i love a good stew, and usually make large batches in order to freeze several portions.
my short term plans are to learn to store and process(be that freeze or can) the vegetables and fruit i'm growing, and once i'm up to speed with that, i will try canning some meat....perhaps that beef stew!, and see how it goes.
thanks again, both of you provide very useful and informative posts on this board.

[NCLee]

Kiwirach, when I canned beef, I canned it separately to be used in stews. No longer can it due to diet restrictions. Today I can venison, when I can get it. Again, it's canned without anything except the broth that was used to hot pack it in the jars.

The reason why I do this rather than can venison stew, is that when I use the meat, I can put it into a number of different recipes. I'm not locked into the stew recipe that I would have used to can it.

Using beef as the example, I can open a jar, use the liquid to make a brown gravy with mushrooms. Add the beef and seasonings, simmer, then serve over rice or mashed potatoes. Or, add the beef cubes to a big pot of homemade vegetable soup. Or, add some fresh or canned carrots, potatoes, and onions for a quick stew. Or, shred the chunks and mix with BBQ sauce and simmer for a great sandwich.

FWIW, I use this approach when canning almost all of the meats I can. Rather than canning recipes, I can "ingredients" to be used in recipes. Thus, each meat can be used in a variety of ways when it comes time to prepare a meal.

Just some more thoughts that you may find to be useful.
Lee

[kiwirach]

Thanks Lee, that makes complete sense. i'll certainly revisit all these threads when the time comes. As i say, i need to get up to speed with processing the things i'm growing first, then move on from there.

[Mom_of_Four]

I do about 60% canning, 30% dehydrating and 10% freezing. I don't like freezing much because of freezer burn or power outages. I'm starting to dehydrate more and more things because of the ease of storing and using them. Recently I've been cooking and dehydrating hamburger to store in jars. But like another poster said, there's something really satisfying about seeing row after row of gleaming jars full of canned food.