What are you canning now?

[vfem]

I have orange/tangerine marmalade started and 'sitting' over night. I boiled 4 sliced oranges and 3 slices tangerines in 6 cups of water for 10 minutes. I removed from heat, added 6 cups of sugar and mixed to dissolve. Now tomorrow I'm supposed to put it back ON the heat bring to a boil for 1 minute, reduce heat to simmer for 30 minutes then bring back to a boil for 1-5 minutes until the 'tested' bit on a cold plate gels.

We'll see if that recipe turns out or not. I am YET to get marmalade to work for me.

On the other side of canning, I filled 2 Quart jars with lavender wrapped in cheese cloth, and covered in sugar for some lavender sugar in a couple of weeks. I also did 1 Quart jar of sugar covering 2 split vanilla beans for vanilla sugar. In a couple of weeks we're going to have some AWESOME sugar. I also have a Quart jar full of orange peel and vodka for orange extract.

Too bad I have to wait weeks for them to be ready, but I did order some GREAT containers from SpecialtyBottles.com for the sugar. They're going to be so pretty when labelled.

Here's the lid>>>> http://www.specialtybottle.com/tindeepcontainer8ozwtwistlugcover.aspx

 

[Olive Hill]

How about cranberries?? I am finding cranberries on sale and making cranberry sauce. I looove whole cranberry sauce! It's so simple, yet tasty!

I really just prefer to eat local. Most everything I can is from my own garden. Sometimes it's hard though when mid-winter comes and it's still so far off until anything is ripe here again. Oh well.

 

[marty8587]

I walked slowly past the demo, made acouple turns.... things are tight we didn't buy ourselves anything but socks. One too many trips afte4r X-mas and it is ours!! Vitamix. I mean it, this thing is very powerful. I was impressed.

 

[Frogdogtimestwo]

I am loving our new Vitamix! Can't wait for canning season to get here, I think it is going to make tomatoes a breeze. Until then the kids are thrilled with the smoothies every morning

 

[Happy Chooks]

I am loving our new Vitamix! Can't wait for canning season to get here, I think it is going to make tomatoes a breeze. Until then the kids are thrilled with the smoothies every morning

I'm loving mine too - I started a new thread so we can all share our favorites.

 

[vfem]

Ut oh... missing out what this vitamix is?! Going to go read the other thread you started.

For now, I just put the marmalade back on the stove... turns out I bring to a bowl and let simmer for 2 hours today. Then back to a soft boil for about 30 minutes, however long it takes to reach 220 degrees so I know it sets.

Wish me luck!

 

[Frogdogtimestwo]

Canners I just saw on Facebook Tattler reusable canning lids are on sale for 40% off today. You get 100 reg mouth and 100 wide mouth for 85.00 with free shipping at markdown.com

 

[GhostRider65]

Ok gals/guys I need some help, I want to make dog food for my dogs, I froze all the extra venison scraps and now its snowing for the next 2 days so I want something to do and thought this project was as good as any....
so here's the plan I got chicken, venison the chicken livers gizzards ect. I will use organic brown rice, and right now I'm making powdered eggs to add wish I could just use scrambled, would be so much easier.......
anyway I will also add wheat germ, and corn peas and carrots. Now the best way to do all this is a mystery to me, I will pressure cook the meat till almost tender then grind it all up what about the rice, should that be precooked? as well, it will get canned at 90 minutes after everything is incorporated into the mix, and I really don't want it to turn to mush, but again it will expand some ??? so what to do about that? any help would be most appreciated..... TY Kim

 

[Olive Hill]

Hmmm, I'll be interested to see the answers on this. Seems to me that grinding it all up would make it awful dense and perhaps unsafe for canning. I guess it depends on how finely you ground it though.

 

[Frogdogtimestwo]

Ok gals/guys I need some help, I want to make dog food for my dogs, I froze all the extra venison scraps and now its snowing for the next 2 days so I want something to do and thought this project was as good as any....
so here's the plan I got chicken, venison the chicken livers gizzards ect. I will use organic brown rice, and right now I'm making powdered eggs to add wish I could just use scrambled, would be so much easier.......
anyway I will also add wheat germ, and corn peas and carrots. Now the best way to do all this is a mystery to me, I will pressure cook the meat till almost tender then grind it all up what about the rice, should that be precooked? as well, it will get canned at 90 minutes after everything is incorporated into the mix, and I really don't want it to turn to mush, but again it will expand some ??? so what to do about that? any help would be most appreciated..... TY Kim

On sufficient self this has been done alot http://www.sufficientself.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=1936 go here for detailed instructions, even though it is cat food, it should be the same principle. HTH's!