Category: Canning Cooking

The Rational Prepper - Canning

6/13/2024

I've been doing some rainy-day canning this spring.

Pressure Canning
Pressure canning is still a challenge and I have difficulty getting all the jars in a batch to seal :-(

Liquids seem to be the most difficult ... I recently made a batch of pasta sauce and only 3 of 5 jars sealed. The failed jars are still thoroughly cooked and will keep in the fridge for a few weeks, but it's disappointing.

Dry Canning
I've been using mylar bags for preserving shelf-stable dry goods like rice and beans. Properly stored, dry goods will stay fresh for 10 years or more.

Recently, I discovered a great vacuum sealer for canning dry goods as well as salt and sugar.

When I opened the last bag of Basmati rice from 2018, the aroma and consistence was still perfect. It will take a few months for us to use 5 lbs of rice so I transferred the rice into jars. I was happily surprised that the vacuum-sealer worked perfectly every time and I've now used it to seal many jars of pickling salt (which was getting hard and lumpy).

As an aside, I use leftover jars from Classico pasta sauce for dry-canning. My friend, Jane, warned me that these jars shouldn't be used for pressure canning because the stock-persons at the supermarket use box cutters to slice the boxes open. If the jars are scored they could burst in the pressure canner, but they are perfectly safe for vacuum canning.

I buy Classico whenever there's a really good sale. If you reuse the Atlas jars the pasta sauce is almost free.

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The Rational Prepper - Apocaloptimist

6/9/2024

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Summer is almost here so it's a good time to talk about some Spring projects.

Victory Garden Expansion
The Victory Garden was a disappointment last year, but I decided to expand the garden anyway. Over the past several weeks I've added a 9x18 section to the east of last year's garden.

Since the ground slopes up to the east I decided to use 1' high containers rather than the 2' containers in the original garden. The back half of this section already has 18-24 inches of topsoil so no containers are needed.

Of course, the electric fence had to be extended to keep Bambi and Yogi out. The wildlife is so inconsiderate. The posts are set in concrete. Like last year, I ran three stands of electrified wire and then attached rabbit fencing. Installing the rabbit fencing is really tedious but it keeps the raccoons out and strengthens the fence.

This expansion more than doubles the size of our growing area. However, this is NOT a garden that could sustain us in an apocalypse. As I've mentioned in previous posts, I'm an apocaloptimist ... I'm prepping for continued inflation and the decline in quality of 'industrial' vegetables.

If I feel ambitious, I'll add a similar extension to the west (left) next year.

The Guardians of the Garden
We now have two whimsical guardians at neoTerra! We have a tactical garden gnome with a rocket launcher (He's small but deadly!) and a fierce Gargoyle (to ward off evil spirits and demons).

We've had the Gargoyle for many years but he was lost in the weeds. I decided to upscale an expended Starfleet photon-torpedo casing as a pedestal so he now has a place of honor.

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The Rational Prepper - Canning Food Update

10/6/2022

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No pictures today. Just an update.

As I mentioned yesterday, I was disappointed that two (of eight) jars did not seal on my last canning attempt. I have now used the Canner five times and always had at least one jar that didn't seal.

Upon inspection, it seemed that the two jars that failed to seal were very full. The instructions say that there should be 1 inch of empty 'headroom' in the jar before you seal and place in the Canner.

This rule is annoying... a pint jar should hold 16 ounces which would be about 1 lb of meat. However, with an inch of headroom the jar only holds about 14 ounces... and I'm stuck with leftover product. Sometimes (often) I overfill the jars.... as an engineer I expect that a 16 ounce jar should hold 16 ounces.... dammit!

Anyway, Tuesday afternoon I went to Kroger and they had bulk Italian sausage on sale. I thought 'hmmm, I don't have to cut this up or weigh it, I can just pack it into the jar with the correct headspace and no liquid'. Honest, a little cartoon bubble appeared over my head with those exact words.

I had four empty jars left from the case of 12 so I did two jars of Italian sausage and two jars of ground beef (with a few sweet peppers thrown in). As expected I had about three ounces of sausage and three ounces of beef left over, but the jars had the proper headspace.

When I checked the jars this morning they were all properly sealed. YAY!

Of course, an experiment with just four jars doesn't prove much... but it is encouraging. From now on I will 'under-fill' the pint jars.

As an aside, regular canned-goods (beans, carrots, potatoes, etc) are in 14.5 ounce cans. I always thought that was just deceptive... but maybe a canned pint has always been about 14.5 ounces. This could be a long standing, and well concealed, deception by the Matriarchy... to short the men by 10% on every pint!!

In conclusion, what to do with six ounces of leftover pork and beef?? Maybe a mini meatloaf for tonight's dinner.... and a real, 16 ounce pint of beer.

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The Rational Prepper - Canning Food

10/4/2022

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One of the best ways to fight inflation (or plan for zombies) is to learn how to can your own food

Pressure canning can be very time consuming and I'm lazy so I decided to buy a Presto Digital Pressure Canner. It's pretty smart and it won't blow-up your house if you happen to wander off to take care of other projects (or sit on the deck with a cold one).

I used my Presto a few times earlier in the year and then got distracted with summer projects. Yesterday I decided to put my training-wheels on and give it another go. Kroger had chuck roast on sale a couple of weeks ago so I bought a couple... about 7 lbs overall.

In my previous attempts I cooked the food and then canned it. That is double work... this time I decided to "raw-pack" the meat.... in other words it goes into the canner raw.

I partially froze the beef so I could cut it into thin slices. I decided that I would can half plain and I would marinate the other half in beef broth with Italian spices to see if it might come out like Italian Beef (YUM!).

The digital canner is pretty simple. There is a bit of babysitting for the first stages (warming the jars and venting once the jars have been filled). But once venting is done you can just walk away for several hours.

The Presto Canner will can and cool the jars, which takes 3 - 4 hours. Then you take the jars out and wait for at least 12 hours to check the seals.

I'm a bit disappointed. In my previous attempts, one or two jars (out of eight) would not be properly sealed. These 'renegades' go into the refrigerator because they have to be consumed within a few days.

Yesterday's attempt was no different. Two jars did not seal so I'll be eating beef stew this week.

I have followed the instructions. I wipe the tops of the jars with vinegar after filling to insure there is no grease or food that might compromise the seal. I put the lids on just finger tight. I'll just have to keep trying until I get it right.

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The Rational Prepper - Depression Era Cuisine

8/6/2022

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Introduction
This segment is partially tongue-in-cheek.

At this point, the most likely situations are recession and runaway inflation. Loss of income is a real possibility for people who are working. Inflation is a drag on everyone, especially those of us on a fixed income.

Inflation
Remember when The Administration told us there was no inflation... then they said it was just transitory... then they said it wasn't such a bad thing because it would make us conserve more..? Recently, several Democrat intellectuals have said "Stop whining America... you are too rich anyway... just suck it up".

I don't know how anyone can approve of Biden's performance, but his approval rating still hovers above 30%. This is proof that people are irrational.

Recession
This week, the Commerce Department announced that the GDP shrank by .9% in the second quarter. This is much worse than the .5% gain that was predicted by Biden's cheerleaders. It follows an even worse decline of 1.6% in the first quarter.

President Biden declared that we are not in a Recession, No Way! C'mon man, this is the greatest economic recovery in history!

This is the same dishonest bullshit he told us about inflation last year. (click the pic).

Amazon alone cut over 100,000 employees in the 2nd quarter and numerous other companies are making cuts or instituting hiring freezes. www.zerohedge.com/economics/amazon-cuts-100000-employees-workforce-single-quarter

But never fear America, the Biden Administration is creating 87,000 new jobs at the IRS as part of the deceitfully named Inflation Reduction Act. It's classic Democrat economics... crush productive businesses while increasing taxes and expanding unproductive government. www.dailywire.com/news/bidens-inflation-reduction-act-would-allow-irs-to-hire-up-to-87000-new-employees-raise-taxes-report

Lean Cuisine
History seems to repeat itself. The Great Depression followed the Great Pandemic (the Spanish Flu) and the Great Drought (the dustbowl was the greatest drought in modern history).

Here are some great meals from the Great Depression... for the coming days when you can't afford food. Many of the better depression-era meals centered around hot dogs, spam or dehydrated chipped beef. YUM!

Of course, even that crap was often unaffordable (or unavailable) so folks had to improvise a lot. Some of my favorites include: www.listchallenges.com/depression-era-food

Hoover stew (Macaroni, hot dogs and canned tomatoes)
Creamed peas on toast
Creamed chipped beef (aka, shit on a shingle)
Mayonnaise sandwich (if you are lucky enough to have mayo)
Lard sandwich YAY!
Bacon fat sandwich (even better than lard)
Oatmeal with lard (better with bacon grease, of course)
Spam and noodles. (Like Hoover Stew but made with Glorious Spam)

Click the pics for recipes.

Hoover Stew

Creamed Peas on Toast

Creamed Chipped Beef on Toast

Stock Up Today!!

Remember America, the elite Democrats are telling you that you are too prosperous and you live too well.

Just a few days ago Mary Daly, the Fed President for San Francisco, said "I don't feel the pain of inflation anymore. I see prices rising but I have enough... I sometimes balk at the price of things, but I don't find myself in a space where I have to make tradeoffs because I have enough, and many Americans have enough". I suppose I should mention that Ms. Daly is a staunch Progressive who makes $422,900 per year at the taxpayers expense. www.zerohedge.com/political/i-dont-feel-pain-inflation-anymore-says-wealthy-fed-chair-ivory-tower

So, peasants, quit whining and vote Democrat.

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The Rational Prepper - Canning

The Rational Prepper - Apocaloptimist

The Rational Prepper - Canning Food Update

The Rational Prepper - Canning Food

The Rational Prepper - Depression Era Cuisine

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