Food Preparation

Canning Basics: Mason jar myths are rampant on the internet!  MYTH:  Brand new canning jars fresh out of the box are sterile and do not need to be washed. New jars are not sterile. Before use they should be checked for breakage or manufacturing defects, and then washed. In fact, jars should always…

Canning Basics: Busting more Mason jar myths MYTH:  Canning jars can be sterilized in the oven.  Canning jars can even be used for baking.  No and no. Canning jars are made from annealed glass and are not designed for the dry, fluctuating heat of an oven. These conditions can cause…

Preparing canning jars is an important step in the process. One of the very first steps in the canning process is preparing your equipment, including canning jars. Here’s how to go about prepping your jars for canning.Inspect.  Whether used or fresh out of a new box, inspect jars to make sure…

It's not always necessary to sterilize jars before canning.When canning, sterilizing jars is essential only when processing times are less than 10 minutes. For processing times of 10 minutes or more, pre-sterilization is not required – the jars become sterilized during processing. Can you pre-sterilize…

Cook them properly and not in a slow cooker! Red kidney beans are a healthy food – unless they’re not cooked properly. They contain a compound (“PHA”), found in many types of beans, and at especially high levels in red kidney beans. PHA can be toxic at high levels; in fact, consuming only 4 or 5 raw or…

Canning Basics: Use a weighted gauge to test a dial gauge's accuracy. Pressure canner dial gauges* should be tested annually for accuracy to ensure that food is not under-processed (and thus potentially unsafe) or over-processed (resulting in lower quality food). Many Cooperative Extension services will…

Keep your canned fruit looking light and fresh. Many light-colored fruits, as well as the stem-ends of cherries and grapes, can discolor and darken when exposed to oxygen. To retain good color and flavor when canning fruit, use high-quality fruit at the proper maturity, and place prepared (peeled,…

There are no safe methods for home canning pumpkin butter. Pumpkin butter is a delicious autumn fruit spread that many folks love to preserve and sometimes give as gifts for the holidays. While canning pumpkin butter was once common, decades ago scientific studies found safety issues with the home…

Proper handling and preparation of eggs are important for safety.  Eggs are a wonderful, nutritious food that come so conveniently packaged in their own individual shells. But raw eggs can harbor Salmonella – both on the shell itself and inside the egg, too. Egg shells can be contaminated from…

Be safe when handling raw flour Flour is, generally speaking, a raw agricultural product which has not undergone any treatment to kill pathogenic bacteria – such as E. coli and Salmonella – that can cause foodborne illness.  Several disease outbreaks associated with flour and flour products …