M A G N A N I M I T Y

 

HOW LONG? 10 Pounds for 25 minutes 

How to can green beans.  This beans for you.  My mother canned, my grandmother canned, and my in laws all can.  Thus, I can.  We have the best recipe in the world by now, of course!  The details: step-by-step. 

1.  Pick. String (if applies).  Break.  Wash green beans in a sieve.  If it takes a while and you have fridge space, they stay fresher and easier to break if chilled.  I wash mine after breaking so that the strings don’t get stuck all over everything. Cut off bad spots.  Peel any very soft or overripe beans and just use the beans.  Throw away any shriveled, “shucky” or overly flat beans (unless you like flat beans…my kids do).

2.  While others are breaking beans, wash jars in HOT water.  If you have a dishwasher, go ahead and let them go through the “dry” cycle. 

3.  Determine if your jars are WIDE mouth, or “regular” mouth jars.  Buy appropriate lids and find or obtain matching sized BANDS (screw on rings that go over the lids) or send hubby running to your local grocer or supermarket.  You can buy just lids and re-use the rings, or buy them as a set. You can buy entire sets of jars, rings, and lids…or find good jars at a yard sale and add what you need later.  If you buy a canner used, good idea to take it to a cooperative extension office and have them pressure it up for you to make sure the guage is accurate.  Don’t want to blow the rook off the house. 

4.  Locate canner, gasket (check to be sure it’s hasn’t gotten dry rot (VERY elastic and prone to break…do not store gasket outside.  Leave it in your pans or towel drawer.  Locate pressure guage (probably attached) and screw down metal stopper.  (Note:  test and see how many jars your canner will hold so that you know how many jars, lids, and bands to prepare).

5.  As you get close to canning, put small sauce pan of water on to boil.  Do not boil lids, but keep them nice and hot at a low simmer for 15-20 minutes…only the number you need.  This softens the seal on the lids.

6.  Fill canner about quarter way full of water, and begin to warm it, but don’t get it TOO hot yet…don’t want to break any jars with too much a temp change as you put the jars in later.

7.  Obtain/find where you put either plain salt or “canning salt”. (see #9)

7B.  Wash beans in a sieve.  Rinse off all dirt. 

8.  Fill jars with beans!  I fill to the full.  Some “tamp” them in and pack ‘em tight.  We never eat a full jar anyway, so I’m not to prone to tamp (poke tightly in with a butter knife).

9.  Add desired salt to beans.  I use 1/4 tsp. of canning salt OR 1 tsp. of regular salt.  Some say regular iodized salt can turn some veggies brown.  I’ve never found with beans and it seems to work, so if I’m short, I exchange.  Add water to jars –3/4 full of a WIDE mouth jar, or approximately to the curve of a regular jar.

10.  With a clean towel, wipe the rim of each jar after adding salt to clean off any granules which may have stuck on the rim.

11.  Lift hot lids out of the water carefully with a fork.  Use a towel or fingers to place the lid on the jar.  Add the band tightly while the lid is still hot.

12.  Note:  At each stage, check for integrity of the glass jars.  Old jars CAN crack.  Do not use a jar with a nick in the rim…the lid will not seal.  New jars can have a defect.  IF a jar cracks when you put it in the water…ALL the food (beans) HAVE to come out before you pressure up the canner.  We don’t want a bean stuck in the pressure valve release hole.  Bad news. 

13.  Lift the jar of beans into the warming water in the canner.  Some canners hold 6 Qt, mine holds 7 Qts. (You might use a towel so that if the glass breaks when it hits hot water, as some do, you don’t get sprayed).

14.  After all jars are in place, place gasket in canner lid. I often do not get mine positioned in the correct groove the first time, but you can tell by the way the lid fits on mine that something is wrong.  There is usually a very narrower groove for it lower– where I’m pointing in the picture.  If it doesn’t seem to be coming up to pressure when the lid is on, take the lid back off, using towels on your hands, and inspect the gasket.  It may need to be stretched to fit, or have grease or oil added to it to promote elasticity and swelling. Stretch, but not overly.

15.  Place the lid on the canner.  Usually, there is a “lock” indicator.  You can perhaps see in the picture where the lines line up on the canner helping you align the lid.  NOTE:  MY OLDER CANNER LID WILL NOT GO ON THE POT UNLESS THE POT ITSELF IS FACING ME CORRECTLY WITH THE WORDS “OPEN” AND “CLOSE” ON THE  POT SHOWING ME WHERE TO PUT THE LID ON.  Newer canners it likely doesn’t matter.   Put the lid on, twist it clockwise slightly and feel it tighten down.

16.  OPEN THE STEAM VENT VALVE, WHICH NEEDS TO BE IN PLACE ON THE LID now.  I’ve put mine on after it starts steaming if I’ve forgotten it, but you really have to watch carefully for steam burns doing this.  It’s advisable to reduce heat before putting it on if you forget to add it when you start the process. 

17. Once the pressure canner starts to steam, allow it to go at “FULL STEAM” for 3 minutes (you’ll see steam “shooting” out of the canner straight as opposed to little “puffs”.  This gets a lot of the excess air out of the canner.   

NOW, THEN tighten down the steam valve and bring pressure UP to 10 pounds (assuming your canner’s gauge tested accurately), by tightening down the air pressure valve.  You are “pressured up”.  Lower heat to about 1 or so on most oven dials.   WATCH CAREFULLY.  DO NOT LEAVE THE KITCHEN OR BE READING EMAIL OR IT WILL GET AWAY FROM YOU and potentially blow a hole through the room of your home.  Start timer for 25 minutes.  You may have to increase or decrease heat to keep it around 10 pounds. 

18.  After 25 minutes, you can turn it off.  (During canning,  I usually try to not have the kids running and jumping in the kitchen, just in case.)   Let the canner cool.  DO NOT FORCE THE LID OPEN BEFORE THE CANNER HAS COOLED.  You may take the lid off after pressure is at 0.  I usually try to leave my jars there if I have time and led them sit a while, even overnight or while I’m out.  If you need to take them out hot and can more…use two towels, one on top of the jar, and one supporting the bottom as you life the jar out of the canner.  If the jar breaks or has developed a crack, this way you don’t get splashed so much as debris hits the hot water.  If one breaks, take the other jars out, clean out the canner (after it cools and you can handle it, and keep going. 

19.  Sit the jars on a towels folded in half.  They are hot, and this gives them a “cushion” when you sit them down.  BE CAREFUL AND GENTLE, THEY ARE NOT YET ‘SEALED DOWN’ COMPLETELY.  You may or may not hear “popping” as the air is out of the jar and the lids seal down.  DO NOT TAKE THE BANDS OFF THE JARS UNTIL THE LIDS NO LONGER “POP UP” WHEN YOU PUSH ON THEM and the jars are cooled.  If the lids still do not “stay down”, the jar did not seal.  I canned 21 jars and only one did not seal.  Stick it in the fridge to cook in a few days, or have it for supper. 

20.  Label the lids with a permanent marker with the year.  Use your oldest jars first.  (After you sample one or two jars from this year, of course!).  Store.  They store a very long time…if they are discolored, you know it’s time to throw them away. 

21.  Store canner and bands.  Again, do not store the gasket outside…it’s more prone to dry out.  I take my bands off my jars.  Some leave them together.  I don’t own that many.  I just take them off and keep the bands and extra lids in a plastic grocery bag with the canner. 

22.  That’s it.  Hope it’s helpful.  I am not responsible for misinformation or accidents, though I’ve edited this 4-5 times to try to be sure.  Double check with other respectable sites.  I’m happy to try to answer questions you may have.

ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS PEOPLE HAVE HAD:

I forgot to add the salt, now what?  Well, the salt is a biG part of the preservative.  Therefore, you need to set these jars aside on your cabinet and use them first.  They should last a few months, but I wouldn’t store them long term without salt.  Also, bump your seasoning up to compensate as you cook them.  I like to add a tsp of salt, a dash of pepper, and for GREAT beans, a strip of bacon cooked in it, or some left over reserved bacon grease. 

I broke a jar, now what?  That’s in the article above.  No need to panic.  It happens. Just be careful, and no, you don’t need to eat the beans in the pot, there may be glass in there.  Clean out the canner good before you continue to can with it.  Stray beans can clog the vent hole prematurely.

A jar didn’t seal:    Check this article.  Use these beans for supper, or store a few days in the frig.  If there are many, review the process here to make sure you are covering everything. 

Why do I hear a funny rattle of jars hitting together inside the canner?  Because some jars are narrower than others if you aren’t using standard canning jars.  They will knock against each other until you get the canner up to pressure.  I set the canner to a bit lower heat early on to minimize this and reduce the chances of breaking a jar.

Can I Can Less Than a Full Canner?  I usually just fix a big “mess” of beans or share when a neighbor when this happens.  Theoretically, you can as long as the canner is balanced.  Especially if you are only missing the “center” jar, it will probably can fine.  Less than that, and I probably wouldn’t mess with it.

I Can’t Get the Lid ON My Canner!   Spin the pot itself toward you and see if your canner requires the pot to face you.  It may have words like “open” and “close” to help you.

Thanks for stopping by!  Let me know how it works out for you.