Canning meat is an area of preparedness that I have zero experience with. One of the members of the 1776PatriotUSA Facebook Group just started a YouTube channel. Her first two videos are on canning chicken. With my recent interest in canning meat, this was perfect timing.
As Sheila mentions meat must be canned using a pressure canner. I have the same Presto pressure canner featured in the video and for the money, it does a great job. A higher quality but much more expensive option is the All American. One advantage of the All American is there is not a replaceable lid seal to worry about.
I’m going to talk to the Wifey and give it a shot soon.
Canning Chicken Part 1:
Canning Chicken Part 2:
Awesome information and great timing for us! Thanks.
– Keep Looking UP
I have canned chicken, turkey, potatoes, chicken stock, and chili. The AA is expensive and may not work on a glass topped stove because of the weight of the canner and the jars in it. If you want to get serious about canning and and water bathing, get the newest Ball Blue Book. It is the bible for the home canner. Also, some things cannot be pressure canned because density is an issue. If what is in the canner is too dense, the internal temperature does not get hot enough to kill botulism spoors. Also potatoes must be peeled, you cannot can them with the skins on.
My husband likes the chicken because by opening 2 jars and making some rice, we have enough soup to last for several meals.
Once you are bitten by the canning bug, you will have a new respect for your garden or your local Farmer’s Market.
Thanks MI Patriot. I have the Ball book now but may pick up the latest.
Let me assure you that the AA canner works GREAT on my glass top stove. My wife and I can all sorts of meat on ours. We also can deer meat (no fee for processing), rabbit meat, and various large cuts of meat we buy on sale. We canned for years with the Presto canner, but when we bought the All American canner we never used the Presto again. A huge advantage of using the canner is the longevity of storage and no loss of frozen food if the power goes out.
Thanks Bpitt722.
Very good overall, but she is using the jar lifter upside down. The rubberized green areas grab the jars and the black wooden handles are for your hands to lift the jars.
That made me watch the videos. I am speechless.
Oh my, it’s true. She’s using the jar lifter upside down. Whoops.
We gather a few times a year to can and have two big American canners that do 60 jars a cycle. We did 240 pounds of chicken last gathering. Group labor is the way to go. Also, we run the pair outside on one of those propane camp stoves with the two giant burners–it keeps the heat outside.
We also have Americans smallest that does 1-4 jars. It’s the one we use to develop recipes. Really helped with the beef recipe. Brown all 4 sides of 1X1 inch strips of cheap roast on the grill. Cut into 1X1 inch cubes, cover with gravy and process 50 minutes. Canned roast beef, tender and good.
I did 36 pints last year and 24 the year before. Got the chicken from Zaycon foods, cut it into 1 inch cubes, put the cubes into jars followed directions for pressure canning. Still have a couple of pints left. Ready to do some more
I also get chicken from Zaycon, and I’ve canned it 2 or 3 times. I just pack it into the jars whole instead of cubing it, since I’m going to shred it when it comes out anyway, and it saves me a bunch of time not cutting it into cubes. As long as you leave the right headspace, it works fine either way. I’ve also pressure-canned beef chunks (delicious!), ground beef (won’t do it again, weird texture), ham (won’t do it again, turned it flavorless), meatballs (won’t do it again, mushy & flavorless), and corned beef (you must cut all visible fat off, but it’s heavenly!). Ham in split pea soup canned up just fine, but ham by itself wasn’t tasty. I’d love to can up some albacore or cod or halibut but I won’t until I can catch my own, and that’s going to need a lot of advance planning.
I have a Presto canner and it works well enough, but my best friend has an All American and wow, did I have canner envy when I used it! The seal was stuck even more than 30 minutes after the pressure read zero, and we thought we’d broken something but it did eventually pop off with no harm to the jars or contents. I think we just didn’t use enough oil the first time we used the canner.