{"id":4331,"date":"2014-10-02T03:00:10","date_gmt":"2014-10-02T07:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/?p=4331"},"modified":"2014-10-02T03:00:10","modified_gmt":"2014-10-02T07:00:10","slug":"q-and-a-water-loss-in-jars-and-off-grid-dehydrating","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/2014\/10\/02\/q-and-a-water-loss-in-jars-and-off-grid-dehydrating\/","title":{"rendered":"Q and A: water loss in jars and off-grid dehydrating"},"content":{"rendered":"

Water loss in jars<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is my first year of pressure canning, ever, and I have a question regarding water loss from the canning jars. When I pressure canned green beans the water loss was minimal. When pressure canning beets the jars lost quite a bit of water during the canning process. There is at least 1\/2 a jar of water or more left but I wanted to make sure they were still safe to eat with water not covering all the food. I followed the process exactly per your canning book and the pressure canner instruction manual and the jars have all sealed perfectly. I also used Tattler canning lids if that makes a difference, following their newest instructions exactly. Is it possible that the beets absorbed that much more water than the green beans did? Would it be better to fill the jars of starchy foods only 3\/4 full and add more water to allow for more water absorption by the food? I would appreciate any tips you could give me.<\/em><\/p>\n

Teresa Liechti<\/em>
\nMilbank, South Dakota<\/em><\/p>\n

First of all, the loss of liquid from your jars does not mean the food is no longer safe to eat. It will be fine. Here are a few causes of liquid loss during processing: Food packed too tightly or jars packed too full, pressure fluctuated during processing, jars not taken out of the canner until canner is cool (not pressure returned to zero) or “hurrying’ the return to zero at the end of processing by bumping the weight or petcock. It does not matter that you used Tattler lids. It is possible that the beets absorbed more water but that isn’t common. Always follow the processing directions, including adding water or liquid to cover the food where needed. Just keep at it. You’ll work out your problems and so far they’re minor. Congratulations on beginning to pressure can! Like everything, the more you do it the better you’ll become. — Jackie<\/p>\n

Off-grid dehydrating<\/strong><\/p>\n

You mentioned the other day that you had two dehydrators going. How do you run them when off grid?<\/em><\/p>\n

Bonnie<\/em>
\nNatchitoches, Louisiana<\/em><\/p>\n

I start them when we’re planning on having the generator on for awhile, usually when I’m washing clothes or Will is using power tools. It’s amazing that in just a couple of hours, the food dries down a whole lot. Then I set the dehydrators on a table on our enclosed back porch, where it’s real warm (South side of house) and continue to dry down. The next time we have the generator on, I plug them back in. Usually a couple of times like that and the food is crispy dry. I can run one dehydrator from our battery bank, full time. But when I use two I have to switch them around or it sucks our batteries out of power. — Jackie<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Water loss in jars This is my first year of pressure canning, ever, and I have a question regarding water loss from the canning jars. When I pressure canned green beans the water loss was minimal. When pressure canning beets the jars lost quite a bit of water during the canning process. There is at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4331"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4331"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4331\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/JackieClay\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}