Introduction to Canning

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Welcome to Canning Season! Strawberries are ripe for the picking (if there is an open pick your own in the area). Last year during strawberry season, I picked 22 pounds of strawberries with my fiance and managed to can most of it. I also ate a fair amount of strawberries. There is nothing like a strawberry straight from the field. This year I had to settle for ordering two flats of strawberries (16 quarts total).

Before introducing you to all my favorite Strawberry Jam recipes, you should learn how to can and a little baout .

About seven or eight years ago, I ended up with these super sweet and amazing blueberries that I wanted to keep forever. After eating a pint of blueberries straight from the fridge, I started googling and found countless blueberry jam and jelly recipes. Lucky for me, my mother has a huge kitchen and pretty much let me do whatever I wanted as long as I cleaned up. I didn’t have the tools to make life easier, I had a large pot and a handful of mason jars. Surprisingly, no one died eating that first batch.

Useful Tools

I was lucky to find a version of this 6 piece canning kit on clearance because it has most the tools to make your life easier, the only thing it is missing is a trivet.  Before buying that kit, there were many burned hands and spills of water trying to remove jars from the pot of boiling water.

Fruit is commonly preserved as Jams, Jellies, and Preserves which is why I make a lot. There are a lot of different kinds of pectin on the market, most supermarkets have Sure-Jell Liquid Pectin, Ball Classic Pectin, and Ball Low or No Sugar Pectin. I prefer the Ball Low Sugar or No Sugar Pectin and keep this on hand all season.

Types Of Jars

Additionally, there are different kinds of canning jars on the market. Mason Jars are the most common. My theory is Ball, Kerr, and Anchor Hocking are made local so they do not have an import cost and are cheaper. Mason Jars are for sale in most supermarket. While Weck is common in the European Market. A third type of jar is Clamp Jars that are also used for preservation. I have found many jars on Craigslist and Facebook marketplace.

Before using any jar, check to make sure there are no clips in the glass or rust on the lids. Please note: the flat lid can only be used once, but the ring lid and jar can be reused many times.

Jar Storage

After jars have cooled, remove the rings and wash the jars. Washing the jars will remove any left over food drips that you might not notice. When jars are dry, label jars and return jars to storage tray or their original box. Stack boxes 2 high for 16 oz jars, 3 high for 8 oz jars and 4 high for 4 oz jars. Sadly, Jars larger than 20 oz should not be stacked.

If you bought your jars second hand, try to grab a can tray from the super market in the canned good section.

Finally, rings should not be left on the jar during storage. A tight ring will prevent gas from escaping and make it hard for you to tell if a jar has a broken seal. I have two small boxes in my closet just for the rings- one for regular mouth jars and one for wide mouth jars. These are shoe boxes, they’re nothing fancy.

On Canning

The details below will teach you how to safely can with a water bath. Pressure cookers will do a different style of canning but we will talk about pressure canning another day. The USDA does not recommend any electric pressure cookers, Instant Pots are not designed for this.

If you are new to canning, please refer to USDA Canning Guidelines for exhaustive details.

Looking to get started? Check out my Canning recipes listed here.