We will be getting our chickens dressed in a few weeks. My wife and I were thinking about canning some of it. How many of you have canned your chicken? Do you think it tastes better/worse than chicken frozen, then cooked. We have a large pressure canner that we know how to use. Interested to here everyone's expiriences.
I have canned chicken for the last couple years and I love it. You can leave the-bone in or take the meat off the bone. Whichever you prefer. If you can get your hands on a Blue Ball Book (order online or at Book Stores) and that is the instructions that I have followed from the start.
Remember, chicken and other meats MUST be pressure canned, to be safe. You can't can them with a water bath canner. Makers of pressure canners have books with instructions and recipes that can be very helpful, especially when you're new to canning. I still refer to mine whenever I can. I can chicken, venison, pork, or whatever. The question of whether it tastes better or worse than frozen isn't really applicable, because the ways you use the meat are completely different, much of the time. If you want fried chicken, you don't want it canned first. If you want to make chicken and dumplings, pot pie, or use cooked chicken meat in burritos or enchiladas, make chicken salad, or some such, then canned is great. A real time saver, to open a can of already cooked meat, and make something with it. Pressure canned meat will always be tender, so it's a great way to use any meat that's likely to be tough. You can also make soups and stews with meat, and pressure can them. A jar of homemade chicken stew or soup on a cold day, served with hot cornbread, biscuits, or even brown and serve rolls, is hard to beat. I prefer to can chicken without bones, because the bones get so soft when you can, it's hard to get them out, they crumble, sometimes. This is less of an issue with pieces that have large bones, like the thigh. Of course, you probably get a some good minerals cooked out of the bones and into the meat and broth. It's a matter of personal taste, whether to can with the bones or without. I like to use easy to bone parts, such as the breast and thigh, for canning, and freeze other parts to cook in the crock pot. I only can older birds that would be tough. Young birds I freeze. Breast and thighs make nice ground chicken, too if you have a meat grinder. With ground chicken, I make patties, dredge in flour and fry. Salt and pepper just like I do fried chicken. It's the only way I know of to fry a tough old bird and have it easy to chew. If you freeze ground meat in patties like I do, it's another easy way to have a quick meal, as they thaw quickly. I place frozen patties in a plastic bag, and put the bag in warm water, to thaw in a hurry. I hope you'll try canning, it's very satisfying to look at a shelf full of great open-and-heat foods you've put up yourself!
Thanks for the info. We are pretty expirienced with our pressure canner. We did 24 quarts of homemade spagetti sauce w/ meat this summer with out tomatoes, onions, peppers, and herbs from our garden. We have also canned the meat from some hogs we raised. We did the meat from the ham. Open a jar, flour, and brown. It is very good. I prefer that over a smoked and cured ham hands down. We've also done green beans. Dancingbear, the things you refered to about convinience is exactly what we were thinking. Plus the fact that you don't have to worry about freezer burn. We are most likely going to can a portion of our meaties. We may try it on the larger birds, and freeze smaller ones. We have 24 (as of right now, still a few weeks to go), so we will expiriment with what works best for us. Thanks.
canned chicken breast is a wonderful thing to have on hand we use a pint at least once a week chicken salad chicken burritos chicken casseroles i use boneless skinless breasts for that if you can with the bone the bones get nice and crumbly ( i feed that to the cats) and while it does make it's own broth i like it better with water to top off the jars vi