Isabella Woodhouse wrote:
> In article >,
> "Anny Middon" > wrote:
>
>> "Ted Mittelstaedt" > wrote in message
>> ...
>>> I did not want to get into this but I see that I will have to. The
>>> following tomato varieties are known to be low acid: Ace, Ace 55VF,
>>> Beefmaster Hybrid, Big Early Hybrid, Big Girl, Big Set, Burpee VF
>>> Hybrid, Cal Ace, Delicious, Fireball, Garden State, Royal Chico,
>>> and San Marzano. There are others as well. The majority of the
>>> more traditional home-garden raised tomatos are not low acid,
>>> however.
>>>
>>> The USDA recommends pressure canning for tomato products. Their
>>> published recipies ALSO recommend acidification of tomato products
>>> EVEN IF pressure canned. See the following:
>>>
>>> http://www.uga.edu/nchfp/publication...n_guide_03.pdf
>>>
>>> "...Recommendation: Use of a pressure canner will result in a higher
>>> quality and more nutritious canned tomato products..."
>> I have seen the publication -- which is available from the NCHFP which I
>> mentioned in my post.
>>
>> Note that the reason the publication suggest pressure canning is not a food
>> safety issue, but based on the quality of the finished product.
>
> And here's an abstract from a journal article that suggests there is no
> significant difference in any of the quality measures of home-canned
> tomatoes:
>
> <http://fcs.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/7/2/108>
>
> Of course, not having seen the entire article, I have no idea how they
> define "significant". Frankly, I'm a bit dubious. I have always heard
> that pressure canning often results in overcooked, mushy product. So
> that is an old wives tale? When you prepare beans, for freezing for
> instance, you blanch and then cool them rapidly in ice water. That is
> done to improve the quality of the end product. If you let them keep
> cooking, they will get mushy. So it's kind of hard to believe that the
> quality is going to be the same before and after a 30-60 minute
> cool-down time in a hot canner.
>
>>> Note that the USDA guide does not recommend -against- BWB
>>> canning of tomato products (like Salsa). They merely recommend
>>> pressure canning instead of BWB canning of tomato products.
>>>
>>> In other words, they are going to wait until the jury is in, you might
>>> say.
>> I don't thing that's what is going on. I think they have found that
>> pressure canned tomato items are of a higher quality and vitamin content
>> than BWB processed ones -- not that they are waiting to see if there are
>> safety problems with the BWB salsa.
>>
>>> The entire guide is up he
>>>
>>> http://www.uga.edu/nchfp/publication...ions_usda.html
>>>
>>> USDA recommends citric acid or lemon juice specifically, instead of
>>> vinegar, because of taste.
>> Look at the salsa recipe on page 3-16 of the publication. You will see that
>> it specifically calls for vinegar.
>>> The NCHFP site does have a specific blurb about Salsa, they
>>> explicitly exclude low-acid pressure-canned Salsa recipies from
>>> their list, and they also mention that there are other ingredients
>>> that must be tested. Basically they are saying that if your going
>>> to go the acidification route, then while you can reduce Ph with
>>> adding acid, not all ingredients are permeable to the acid that you
>>> add, that is why they recommend against any Salsa recipies they
>>> haven't tested the ingredients list on.
>> Yes -- but that doesn't mean that the salsa recipes they include are in any
>> way unsafe.
>>
>>> Personally I don't understand what the fuss is all about. Pressure
>>> canners are cheap and easy to operate, I have 2 of them both of
>>> which cost less than $10 from Goodwill. (granted, I kept an eye
>>> out for them and it took a while before they showed up) If you
>>> pressure can your Salsa you can use whatever recipie you like, acid
>>> or no acid, just as long as you pressure can it for the time called
>>> for, for the longest time ingredient in it.
>> I have a pressure canner, and I use it for low-acid items I can, not
>> including salsa -- for which I use tested recipes and BWB processing. I
>> find it so much more of a hassle to use, and the BWB processing so much
>> easier, that I do BWB whenever it's safe to do so.
>>
>> In case you are wondering why I find pressure canning to be more of a
>> hassle, it's primarily related to the amount of time it takes. I fill the
>> jars, put them in the pressure canner and put on the lid. It takes at least
>> five minutes (and I'm betting it's more like 10) for the water in the canner
>> to come to a boil. Then steam has to be expelled -- for my canner, for 7
>> minutes. The the pressure thingie goes on. Then I have to wait for the
>> pressure to reach the right level -- another 5 or 10 minutes. Then it's 10
>> minutes of processing (for tomatoes). Then at least an hour for the canner
>> to cool down so I can remove the jars.
>>
>> Total time -- at least an hour and 22 minutes.
>>
>> I tend to do canning marathon session where I can 3 or 4 products at a time.
>> When I BWB can I prepare the next item while jars are being processed.
>> Frequently it's less than half an hour between removing the first set of
>> jars from the BWB and putting the next set in.
>
> Though I have done very little pressure canning, my experience, for the
> few times I've done it, is similar to yours. When pressure canning, you
> can't use a quick release mechanism or hold the pot under cold water
> like you do for pressure cooking. It just has to sit there until the
> pressure comes down on its own. That is a lot of time all right---
> unless you have 2 or 3 pressure canners, a huge kitchen, and don't mind
> fooling with multiple gauges or weights, not to speak of all the storage
> room required. I don't think the people who wrote the article I cited
> included this cool-down time in their calculations.
>
> OTOH, it does take more energy to boil the huge amount of water
> necessary for a BWB canner. But, if you are going to be processing
> sequential batches, that would save some of that energy.
>
> Isabella
Hokay, I'll chime in here. I've been pressure canning for more than 40
years, most of it with the same eighteen-quart canner. Mine is the one
with the gauge that reads the pressure but it also has a jiggler.
Once I turn the heat off the pressure starts to drop and, within twenty
minutes or less, the gauge reads zero. At that stage you can remove the
top. At that point I do something our old home ec agent in Texas taught
us, toss a tea towel over the top and let it sit five more minutes. Once
that's done I lift the rack out, set the rack and jars on a folded towel
and let them cook to room temperature. It is generally recommended that
you let them sit for 24 hours before moving them around to ensure the
entire mass is cool. I've never had a jar fail to seal in the pressure
canner, never had the jar contents go bad (we eat it all up pretty quick
anyway), and, for certain items I prefer canned to frozen. Ie, green
beans, or shelled beans of any kind. Soups, soup stocks, broths, etc.
all get canned to save freezer room for important stuff like vacuum
sealed steaks, roasts, fish, etc.
Sure, pressure canning is a PITA but you get a safer, more convenient
food that will last up to a year or more in a cool place out of direct
sunlight - my pantry.
It's certainly no more difficult or lengthy than messing around with jam
pots, boiling jars for 5, 10, 20 minutes, etc. I quite BWBing tomatoes
twenty years ago when I became uncertain as to the acidity of the fruit.
If I get enough to can I pressure can them.
Oh yeah, none of the food I can has ever become mushy from the canning. YMMV
George
Father Inquisitor, HOSSPOJ