This book is free on Amazon today. As always, these books are only free for a short period of time, so be sure to check and see if it is still free or whether it has gone back to the original price. Link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CJ7ZNYN6
Another OOPS by a novice canner. My wife said a woman was pressure canning something--perhaps soup--and she got confused. She read the thing about leaving the canner sit for 5 minutes after you turn the heat off...for WATER BATH CANNING. This woman tried that with pressure canning, and, although she wasn't burned since she did manage to avoid the steam when she took the weight off, all her jars exploded when the pressure was suddenly released. Hopefully everyone here that cans has been doing it for a while and knows better, but I guess Covid turned a lot of people into gardeners and food preservers. People who haven't canned before or had someone tutor them in proper procedures should take a class of some kind to learn. There is a woman here who, with her family, has a farm from which they support themselves, which is a very difficult thing to do in Alaska. Anyway, she does classes for those novices who want to learn food preservation, and we have heard reports that she uses my wife as a reference for people who have issues with growing and preserving food.
We do not do any canning, but I saw this on Twitter this morning and thought that it was pretty interesting that adding a zinc tablet to a jar of beans to be canned could make a difference in the color of the beans afterwards. Apparently, the zinc keeps the chlorophyl from being leached out during the canning process.
I googled and found that the FDA only approves 75 ppm of zinc when added to green beans. I don't know how the home canner would determine that ratio, but I don't can green beans anyhow.
As you are aware I do allot of fruit canning myself , however I’ve never canned veggies to really comment on keeping the colour or even can veggies full stop ,……personally I can fruit because I know it’s chemical free home grown by myself so I only add a light syrup and don’t really worry about if the fruit discolours during processing ( Nectarine’s) go a funny greyish/ tan colour ) so I’d be very reluctant to add any stuff just the keep veg looking green, …or any other colour …….the alternative is freeze the beans other wise you could be consuming zinc when your body doesn’t really need it . Id highly advise any one who takes supplements to check where they are made now days , I did just that a few days ago ( checked 2 different brands I’d usually get for DH ) and was shocked to learn such a once trusted supplement is now made / owned by / in china. He takes a sup so doesn't have to get up 3-4 times at night for a pee and Glucosamine for his knees
50 miligrams of zinc would be a lot for me. But you don't just eat that. It is in the liquid and we pickle our beans so only eat a few at a time.
I think 40mg is the top end for most people. The issue becomes what form of zinc do you use. I take one that's 60mg, but only 10mg is elemental (meaning it satisfies 90% of my daily need.) This rabbit hole notwithstanding, using zinc with the beans is a pretty clever solution. I wonder how they came up with that solution.
Cherries are grown in the Adelaide hills where it’s cooler in Summer , but we never get cheap enough to can . Most summers the hills fruit farmers get hit with hail storms ..or too much rain ☔️ and it splits the cherries so they keep the prices high to cover costs cherries were $25 kg last Christmas. I’ve never tasted canned cherries I’d think they are nice, it’s way too hot in summer where I’m to grow cherries . The weather where cherries are grown is always cool even in high temp summer days @Don Alaska https://cherriessa.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Cherry-map-2022.pdf
Almost all supplements connect to China, as do all prescription and OTC drugs. It is a sad state of affairs.
I dry most of my fruit to some extent or other. My cherries are what we call 'pie cherries'--not sweet, so I make a freezer preserve with the ones I don't dry. We don't get a lot of them. Birds mostly do even with netting.
There's a short thread on that topic here, Kate. I was in a discussion on another website about supplements' country of origin, and was unable to find any any that are not (a) Made in China, or (b) Made In The USA From "Globally Sourced Ingredients." People were talking about Swanson as being a trusted [expensive] brand, but their FAQs state "We cannot tell you the specific nation where the ingredients in any of our supplements come from." They source globally on the spot market, so a given supplement on a given day may have ingredients from some number of nations. And even Swanson buys from China.