Food Preservation Resources

Due to a popular post on making prickly pear jelly, we get a lot of emails asking for advice on canning. So I thought I’d list three favorite food preservation resources.

I like to go to respected sources when canning for reasons of both safety and reliability. While botulism is fairly rare, it’s a highly unpleasant way to pass this vale of tears. But beyond the safety issue, if I’m going to go through the work of canning, I want to know that the recipe is going to work. There are few things more frustrating than a big batch of jam or jelly that doesn’t set. Yes, you can call it “syrup” but it’s still a big blow to the ego. 

My three favorite resources are the National Center for Home Food Preservation which has recipes for all kinds of food from fruit to meat, the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving and Ball’s website. All of the recipes in these two websites and book follow USDA guidelines.

The reason I came up with a prickly pear recipe is that I couldn’t find any other ones that worked. But if I were canning something like, say, peaches I’d go with one of the above authorities. If you have a favorite food preservation resource leave a comment.

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2 Comments

  1. We made a smallish batch of fig jelly this year and it called for SEVEN cups of sugar. Yeesh. Never doing that again.

    Learning from that mistake, I got a cheapo mandolin slicer for our pears, tossed them in a little lemon juice and cinnamon, and made yummy dehydrated pear with no sugar added.

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