Pressuse Cooking Meat To Preserve It Without Using Electricity

A few months ago, I started the process of learning how to use an All American pressure canner (model 921). I bought it gently used from an older couple and after inspecting it to make sure that the pressure relief valve was still intact and it had all its parts, I stored it for about 6 months before I worked up the nerve to give it a whirl.

A pressure canner is a large kitchen appliance that resembles a typical household pressure cooker with the differences being that they are generally larger in size, offer multiple rocker weight options, have a pressure gauge and require an independent heat source.

Protip: In most cases, pressure canners are too big and too heavy to be safely used on a standard household stove-top. Glass top/flat ranges have been known to shatter under the weight of a "full to capacity" pressure canner.

In the big scheme of things, a pressure canner is more versatile than a standard pressure cooker because it can maintain an internal temperature inside the pot, for the optimal length of time required to effectively preserve food. This, a specific temperature maintained for a set amount of time, is what safely preserves each type of food.

Protip: To preserve meat (for example) the required temperature is 250 degrees F and this temperature needs to be  maintained for 90 minutes.

Think OF A Pressure Canner As A More Precise Pressure Cooker

It lets you safely preserve fruits, vegetables, fish and meat in glass sealer jars. After you successfully complete the pressure canning process (meaning that you have properly filled your glass sealer jars and cooked the contents of those jars at the correct temperature for the correct amount of time) the food within the jars can be safely stored.

At Room Temperature! Indefinitely Without The Risk Of Contracting Botulism And Making Yourself Or Your Family Really Sick

Even meat. It can be safely preserved this way and stored on a shelf at room temperature as long as the seal (which is the tin lid) on the jar doesn't break.

Protip: If the seal does break, the contents of the jar will become exposed to oxygen and start to decay which makes it non-usable and the contents will discolour and smell putrid. If you ever open a jar, only to be assaulted by a disgusting smell, throw the contents of that jar away immediately because it is no longer safe to eat.

Directions:

• Cook the ground beef in a frying pan, exactly the same way you would normally cook ground beef that you are planing to eat right away. 

Protip: Frying the beef in advance will allow you to put the meat in the glass jars without the meat clumping together. Making this extra effort (to cook the meat in advance of sealing it in a glass jar) will ensure that the meat will easily come out of the jar when you want to use it.

• Prepare your jars by washing them with hot soapy water. Rinse and dry them well. 
• Fill the jars with the cooked ground beef and add water to cover the top of it, while still leaving a 1 inch air gap at the top.
• Place the sealer lid in position and hand tighten the rings in place.

Protip: A wide mouth funnel with a large bottom opening will let you fill the glass jars more easily and quicker. In the photo below you can see what one of these special wide mouth funnels looks like.

I preserved 13 pounds (or 6 kg)  of cooked ground beef in 26 pint (or 500 ml) glass sealer jars.

Most pressure canners come with metal risers. The risers are used to keep the glass jars off of the bottom of the canner and they are also used to support another layer of jars when you run it at full capacity. My canner will hold 18 pint (or 500 ml) glass jars. (Nine jars on the bottom and nine jars on top.)

Here's what it looks like with the bottom layer in place:

(Notice that the jars are sitting on the metal riser.)

• Fill the pressure canner with 1 gallon (4 litres) of water and the jars.
• Secure the lid, but do not put the rocker weight on the nipple, yet.
• Turn the propane on high to get it up to temperature quicker. (Do Not Walk Away)
• As the water inside the canner starts to boil, steam will start to sporadically escape from the nipple. Let this boiling progress for about 3 minutes.

• Using a pair of tongs, carefully put the 15 pound rocker weight on the nipple. (Care must be taken to avoid getting burned by hot steam.)

(Notice the rocker weight in its place, opposite the pressure gauge.)

• Drop the propane flame back down to let the jars acclimatize to the higher temperature more gently.
• As the pressure from the steam inside the canner builds, so does the temperature.

• Start a timer for 90 minutes when the pressure gauge reaches 15 pounds pressure (which is also 250 degrees F). The movement on the rocker weight follows a "rock. stop. rock." pattern when 15 pounds of pressure has been achieved.  

I found that at approximately 30 minutes into my 90 minute preserving cycle at 15 pounds of pressure, I had to start adjusting for temperature increases. As the jars and water are at a constant temperature, the pressure and temperature (inside the canner) keeps building. This means that you have to reduce the propane to a lower flame to maintain exactly 15 pounds of pressure.

Protip: Do not walk away from the pressure canner while it's acclimatizing. If you don't adjust the flame level of your propane burner, the pressure and temperature will keep rising and you may blow the pressure relief valve right out of the lid. This puts you at considerable risk because you could easily get severely burned by superheated pressurized steam.

Eventually the pressure will remain constant, but I still made a point of checking the pressure gauge every 10 minutes, just to be certain that there were no fluctuations.

• At the end of 90 minutes, turn the propane burner off. As the temperature of the steam inside the canner drops and turns back  to water, the pressure starts to drop too. When the pressure gauge has almost returned to its lowest setting, you can remove the rocker weight (very carefully) by using an oven-mitt to protect your hand and a pair of tongs. If steam comes out of that nipple, put the rocker weight back down immediately and wait until the pressure drops more before you try to remove the rocker weight  again. If you take the weight off while there is still a lot of steam in the canner the pressure will drop too quickly and all the jars could shatter.
• Once, no steam comes out of the nipple when the rocker weight has been removed, it is safe to open the canner and remove the jars with oven mitts.  The jars will need to cool for a few hours before handling and storing away.

I let them sit outside for approximately 2 hours before I brought them in and let them continue to cool on a counter for another 12 hours.

This is what the jars looked like after they had completely cooled to room temperature:

(Notice the fat has now solidified at the top of each jar. This should be easy to remove as each jar is opened and the meat used.)

I then relocated the jars of canned ground beef to shelves in my cold room. One of my motivations for investing in a pressure canner was so that I could preserve food and store it long term without having to use electricity to do it. 

So far so good

I plan to start opening these jars in a month and I'll provide an update, then.

I welcome your comments and I invite you to follow me on my journey...there might be the odd botulism experiment along the way. ;)

~ Rebecca Ryan