The other day I was reading a sensible and well-written piece by Daisy Luther ("The Organic Prepper") about the dangers of using pressure cookers for canning.
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She also emphasized the need to use a pressure canner when preserving low-acid foods. She wrote: "Pressure canning exceeds the temperature of water bath canning, getting your product into the safety zone. The temperature must reach 240 degrees Fahrenheit, which can only be achieved through steam under pressure. All vegetables (except for tomatoes which are botanically a fruit), meats, seafood, and poultry, must be preserved in a pressure canner."
All truthful and factual information. No argument from me.
But then I read something in the comments that absolutely floored me. Someone named "William C" wrote: "There are other ways to get water to 240 degrees without using pressure. Antifreeze added to the water, and checked with a radiator hydrometer, will raise the boiling temp to as much as 270 degrees. Also, you can skip the water bath and use cooking oils. They can get to over 400 degrees if you want."
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I'm sorry, is he suggesting we submerge our green beans or chicken breasts in a water-bath mixed with antifreeze? Deadly poisonous antifreeze that routinely kills pets?
Or, just as crazy, that we "skip the water bath" and submerge the jars of food in boiling-hot cooking oils?
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With all due respect to William C., this has to be some of the most lunatic and insane canning advice I've ever heard, even worse than those who claim it's safe to water-bath can green beans "because Granny always did it that way."
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I read William C's recommendations out loud to Don and we hashed out the insanity of the man's advice. Don summed it up succinctly: "Or you can just get a d*** pressure canner, for Pete's sake."
Couldn't have said it better myself.
I suppose if you need to preserve green beans without a pressure canner you could dry them. I seem to remember dried green beans called leather britches in the old Fox Fire books!
ReplyDeletePatrice, you have posted these in the past as well.
ReplyDeleteDiethylene Glycol next to a food substance, even if separated. Sheer madness.
I think that man probably was a lunatic. They exist, and go around messing with common sense folks just for fun.
ReplyDeleteThis world is a crazy place and getting crazier!
As someone else said, if you are too concerned about pressure canning stuff like beans, just dehydrate them. It's what I switched to doing a few years ago, rehydrated they taste just like fresh or frozen and don't have the canned taste. To get them completely dry only takes about 10-12 hours in my Excalibur.
ReplyDeleteNot sure if William C is a real person or not, but I had an AI response about how safe bane berries were after they turned black (they are neither safe or turn black)! I am assuming that it meant elderberry or possibly choke cherries, but thank the lord I have been reading foraging books since my teens and knew this was wrong and posted that. I guess that is a question in it's self, who is monitoring AI for incorrect and deadly answers?
ReplyDeleteOhhhhhh K
ReplyDeleteI’m 72 years old and have been Canning/Pressure-canning for a good long 50+ years. And I’ll tell you I have broken many a Jars in Water Bath and Pressure Canning. Tis just part of the game, so expect it to happen.
Let me get this straight, this person wants to contaminate a cooking pot with Anti-Freeze and Can food with it. PS: NO you can’t get that stuff out of the Canner/Pot I don’t care how hard you try, then you’re going to cook the family some nice soup in a pot contaminated with Antifreeze????? There’s a great idea for ya.
Remembering that when one water bath cans the lid allows pressure from inside the Jar (from the liquid/stuff heating) to escape, during the cooling process, with the jars still sitting in Antifreeze, the Jar cools creating a vacuum inside the Jar, POSSABLY and YES, I said “POSSABLY” allowing some of the liquid, Antifreeze, outside the jar to enter the jar. Remember it doesn’t take much Antifreeze to contaminate food.
Then you need to get rid of the Canner/Pot of Antifreeze, right? Soooooo lets just toss it down the sink into the City Sewer, Septic Tank, or maybe toss it onto the Grass, Driveway, Street.
Now let’s move on to the Oil Idea. Yeah, let’s put a pot of oil on the Kitchen Stove and heat it to, as he said 400 degrees. Then drop in some glass jars full of, ohhhhh how about some nice Soup or Meat with moisture in it, ever see what happens to a House when some idiot uses a Turkey Fryer inside the house and it boils over because the Turkey was dumped in the hot oil? By-By House from the pursuing fire.
It would take just one Jar to crack and break causing the Oil to instantly come to a raging inferno on the Kitchen Stove. As I mentioned, when you Boil the Jars, there is moisture in the form of steam that escapes the Jars, where does that go???? You batcha right into that 400-degree oil, again By-By House.
There is an old saying out there and some might take offence, but here goes…..
“Ya just can’t fix stupid”.
If’n you’re going to Can food, get the RIGHT equipment and do it CORRECTLY. Don’t be stupid and risk the consequences. OR maybe just buy your canned food from Wally World.
Yeah, a while back I read advice from a guy concerning "draindown" solar water heating systems, where the solar panel water and the water being heated are separated by a heat exchanger. He said to use automotive antifreeze in the solar side of the system... I wonder if that guy's died of kidney failure since I read that... The SLIGHTEST leak in the heat exchanger would introduce antifreeze into the drinking water!!!! Using antifreeze for canning is RIGHT UP THERE in that realm of idiocy! My GOD!!! Stupid is as stupid does. Darwin often takes care of the rest...
ReplyDeleteI'm going with the AI theory also. I have heard that AI's can get past the basic are you a human tests now, so it is highly likely that was an AI response. I would hope that no human would even think of coming up with that.
ReplyDeleteSadly, there is the question of stupidity or malice.
ReplyDeleteEphesians 5:
…15Pay careful attention, then, to how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, 16redeeming the time, because the days are evil. 17Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.…
Can be both as someone who accepts what a person who in malice intended to harm nasty (assumed Christian) Preppers says it's a GREAT IDEA and lets other useful idiots spread the WORD of Antifreeze canning.
Not like coffee shop radicals are going to can anything and sadly quietly listening in as a bicycle riding old man sipping my coffee, I've heard such chatter.
Unbelievable. The old ethylene glycol takes a VERY small amount to be lethal, and it's a very painful way to die. That stuff has to be disposed of properly, I would never get it in the same room (or house) as my food.
ReplyDeleteWorking on my truck many years ago, I was flushing the radiator, and a drop flew into my mouth. I immediately ran inside and rinsed and spit with water for about 10 min. No harm done. What really shocked me was how good it tasted. If Koolaid could capture that taste, they would outsell Coca Cola.
That's why you have to be so careful not to let pets or animals drink it. They'll wolf it down in a heartbeat.
I'd guess William C has never actually tried either of those methods, and he has probably never used a pressure canner. He may have been trying to show he was the smartest reader of the blog, but he accomplished the opposite.
ReplyDeleteI was intimidated by pressure canning until I actually did it. Then I realized it was not a problem at all. There's no gain from potential workarounds, even if there were viable ones.