Canning ground beef

I have both of your books and I’m wondering about canning ground beef. I see you have a recipe for canning patties and meatballs, but I noticed in your new book you mention that you can use canned ground beef in some of your recipes that would be appropriate for beef crumbles. Is it possible to can the beef as browned crumbles?

Sherri Grubbs
Mosby, Montana

Yes, it is. In fact, you’ll find the recipe in Growing and Canning Your Own Food, on page 179. Canning ground meat is so handy for quick meals. — Jackie

Canning time and measuring tomatoes for canning

I really enjoy your blog and am knee-deep in canning from your canning book and wondering how you get so much canning done. I have an All American canner for 7 quarts or 18 pints which I love. It takes so much time to heat up and cool down I only get about 2 canners a day done if I am doing something with meat in it that takes 90 min. Maybe you have some secret that we all need to know? My next question is from the spaghetti recipe. The recipe calls for 30#’s of tomatoes. I weighed mine after I put them through the Victorio Strainer then wondered if the weight should have been from the whole tomato before I put them through the strainer. Which is correct?

Ruth Martin
Kalamazoo, Michigan

What I do is to can different foods the same day and try to time processing with preparation so that one batch is cooking down in my oven at low temperature (tomato sauces), pickles are soaking in salt brine, and I’m pressure canning another food. I do not can two types of food at once; it’s too easy to get the times mixed up! I have, when I had 8 kids at home, run two pressure canners at once…and one is a huge devil, processing 9 quarts and 14 pints at once! But I was younger and needed to get it done!

The 30# of tomatoes is before you run them through the strainer. (Some folks don’t have a strainer and have to use a food mill, like a Foley, to remove seeds.) — Jackie

Recanning peaches

We got a large can of peaches in light syrup. Can we preserve these into smaller sizes? What is the best way do this? We do have a dehydrator, pressure canner, and water bath canner.

Hollis
Wilmington, Delaware

I’ve done just that, after being given several #10 cans of peaches. Here in Minnesota, we just DREAM about peaches! What I did was to drain the store syrup off, as it tastes slimy to me. Then I made a fresh batch of light syrup using sugar, not corn syrup, and canned the peaches up as if they were fresh ones, in my water bath canner. They turned out very good. I’m sure yours will, too — Jackie