Update on canning booklets

I've received several inquiries about the status of the canning booklets, so I thought now would be a good time to post an update.

The booklets are done. They're fully written. I have three so far: one on water-bath canning, one on pressure canning, and a booklet on 100 FAQs (I was originally thinking it would be 50 FAQs, but you folks had so many excellent questions that the number kept going up and up). Because of the amount of work involved in researching the FAQs, I will offer it at a slightly higher price than the other two booklets.

What I'm doing now is laying the booklets out in InDesign, a desktop publishing program. The FAQ booklet is fairly straightforward -- not many illustrations -- but the water-bath and pressure canning booklets are fairly heavily illustrated with photos and take a bit of work to lay out.

I realized I had no photos illustrating the making and canning of applesauce nor the canning of chicken breasts (both of which I cover in the booklets), so I bought those items yesterday and will do some canning today in order to take pictures.

Please note, there is some cross-over between the FAQ booklet and the canning booklets, but only in areas where I thought something critical should be emphasized in case someone buys one booklet but not all of them. In other words, if someone is trying their hand at pressure canning and bought the pressure canning booklet but not the FAQ booklet, I needed to include critical info in both booklets.

The cover design for the booklets is similar among all three. Here's the rough for the pressure-canning booklet:

As an added note: after some thought, I've decided NOT to offer the booklets through a Kindle download. The process of offering them through Amazon means Amazon gets an astounding 70% of the selling price. If I sell these booklets for a low price as planned, it means I'll hardly get anything if I sell them through Amazon. The rules of selling something through Amazon means I cannot sell the same booklets through my blog. In other words, it's one or the other -- Amazon or the blog. Yes I know Amazon has a much wider market, so eventually I may put them up for sale through them; but for the time being I'll just sell them through the blog.

This means the booklets will be available as a pdf download. This has two advantages: one, you don't have to have a Kindle (or Kindle software) to read them; and two, it means I can have a lot more color photos to illustrate the procedures (Kindle would naturally translate the photos into black-and-white).

It's been a whole lot more work than I anticipated to write, illustrate, and lay out these babies -- but boy howdy have I gotten an education in the process! I have to thank all of you, my lovely readers, for your enthusiasm AND all the wonderful questions you pitched at me when this project began!

By the way, these booklets will be the first of a series I plan to write on general self-sufficiency skills. I have booklets planned on such things as moving to the country, homesteading specifics such as dehorning calves, making dairy products, etc. If anyone has more ideas they want to pitch at me, by all means do so! I can't guarantee your idea will get turned into a booklet, but at this point I'm all ears for new ideas.

Update on canning booklets

I'm making great progress on my e-booklets on canning. Right now I have three either finished or almost finished: one on water-bath canning, one on pressure canning, and one on FAQs about canning.

But boy oh boy, did these turn out to be bigger projects than I anticipated. The water-bath booklet is finished and approved by a friend who's a Master Food Preserver, so that's one part done. I started working on the booklet on pressure canning and got about 2/3 done when I diverted my attention to the booklet on FAQs, trying to address everyone's basic canning questions. What I optimistically began thinking would be 50 basic FAQs is now approaching 85 and likely to go higher.

I thought I knew a lot about canning -- and I do -- but it's nothing to the education I've received in the last three weeks of research and writing. It's like I'm giving myself a course on Master Food Preserving (which, let it be known, is not available anywhere in our region -- I've checked). And it's all thanks to the wonderful list of questions you all provided when I asked.

Here's the rough Table of Contents so far for the FAQs. This is by no means in the final order, nor is it necessarily complete. It's just the working Table of Contents as it exists at the moment.


Introduction
History

• What is Canning?
• Why was canning more popular in the past?
• Why hasn’t the tradition been continued?
• What are the benefits of home canning?
• What is the difference between water-bath and pressure canning?
• What equipment do I need before I start canning?
• What are the differences among canning jars?
• Is it safe to use half-gallon jars?
• What are “spoilers”?
• What causes food poisoning in home-canned food?

• What are acidifiers?
• What are high-acid foods and why is it safe to water-bath them?
• What kind of lids should I use?
• If I heat up a lid for canning and don’t use it, is it still good?
• If I find a loose lid in a drawer, how can I tell if it’s been used?
• Why can’t I re-use flat lids?
• How tight should the rings be screwed on?
• What is water-bath canning?
• Why must I add acidifiers to tomatoes before canning?
• What are low-acid foods and why must they be pressure-canned?

• What is botulism and why is it dangerous?
• What is pressure canning?
• What kind of pressure canner should I buy?
• Can I use a steam canner instead of a pressure canner?
• Can I use a pressure cooker to can food?
• What should NOT be pressure canned?
• How tightly should I pack food in jars?
• Can I speed up how fast a pressure canner loses pressure after processing?
• Can I can fruits without sugar?
• Can I use artificial sweeteners in place of sugar while canning?

• Can I can without salt?
• What is the difference between canning (or pickling) salt and regular salt?
• Can I shorten the processing times while canning?
• Can I process low-acid food longer in a water-bath canner, instead of pressure canning?
• How are processing times determined?
• How do I get over the fear of canning?
• How long will home-canned food store?
• Where’s a good place to get canning jars? What type should I buy?
• What is the difference between difference sizes and styles of canning jars?
• Can canning jars be purchased second-hand?

• Can I re-use spaghetti sauce or mayonnaise jars?
• What causes jars to break during canning?
• Can I process two layers of jars at one time?
• Why do I have to pre-heat my lids?
• Why didn’t my lids seal?
• Does leakage from a processed jar mean it won’t seal?
• How do I know if my lids have sealed properly?
• What is head space and why does it matter?
• How many rings do I need?
• Should I store my jars with the rings on?

• Can I use Grandma’s old jars, zinc lids, and rubber gaskets while canning?
• How long and at what pressure should I pressure-can foods?
• Instead of worrying about what foods should be water-bath canned versus pressure-canned, should I just pressure-can everything to be on the safe side?
• Why must I adjust for altitude?
• How much water should I use while water-bath canning?
• How much water should be in the canner while pressure canning?
• Can I re-can foods?
• Must I sterilize canning jars before use?
• Will my dishwasher sterilize jars?
• Can jars be sterilized by baking them in the oven?

• Can I use my oven to can food? (Oven canning)
• Can I preserve food using the open-kettle method?
• Can I use a microwave to can foods?
• How do I know if canned food is safe to eat? Is there a test to detect botulism?
• If mold is detected inside a jar of home-canned food, is it safe to eat?
• While canning, at what point should I start timing?
• Should I use only pre-approved recipes while canning?
• But what if I want to use my own recipes while canning?
• What if I want to can my own salsa recipe?
• Can I can my own homemade condensed soups?

• Can you give some basic canning recipes?
• How can I keep fruit from turning brown when I can?
• Can I use a pressure canner if the bottom isn’t perfectly flat?
• What if I drop my pressure canner?
• Can I can my own baby food?
• Can I stack my sealed canning jars in the pantry?
• How should I label my processed jars of food?
• Can you describe how to can in metal cans?
• Do I need to boil or cook home-canned food before eating?
• How important is it to remove air bubbles from jars before canning?

• Can I can on a wood cookstove?
• Can I use a camp stove for canning?
• Can I use a glass-top stove for canning?
• What’s the difference between hot-packing and cold-packing jars?

E-booklet updates

I am SO jazzed and excited by these e-booklets I have planned! I have logged and categorized all your wonderful questions, and will try to answer most of them. So far I have three pamphlets in the works: one on water-bath canning, one on pressure canning, and one on "FAQ's" for canning. None of these will cost more than $1.50 (I hope) so they should be affordable to all. I thought about including them all together, but that's a lot of info and may not be necessary for everyone.

I have to figure out the software which formats material to a Kindle, but with luck these will be available by the end of the month.

Seeking questions from novice canners

Dear readers, I would like your input.

I am going to be putting out a series of ebook pamphlets for an inexpensive price, probably $1.49 each, downloadable on a Kindle. While eventually I'll be writing on a number of different subjects, I'm going to start with a very simple beginning guide to canning.

I would like to hear some of your basic questions about canning so I can be sure such information is included in the pamphlets. An example of such a question might be, "Why is it preferred to hot-pack food into jars instead of cold-pack?" Stuff like that.

Remember, these will be very basic guides. But lots of beginning canners have some very basic questions. Just because questions are basic doesn't mean the answers aren't critical.

So all novice canners -- shoot me your questions!