Is there a right way to can vegetables?

Question

I want to make this recipe for chili sauce. One says you should put in water bath canner for 20 minutes. The other one says you can skip the water bath and just boil the lids and rings and put them on the hot jars and they will seal. Which way is the better and safe way?

I have made tasty Hungarian hot peppers the past three years and it is all fresh and the lids don't seal, you just top off the peppers and juice with olive oil and they will stay crisp for a long time, months!! and no one ever gets sick. I have canned just whole tomatoes(water canned) and dill pickles(not water canned) but never anything that is hot.

Answer 1

I've been canning various vegetable with my parents for about 40 years (I'll be 55 later this year) and the boiling of the lids and rings has always worked for us since we pour the chili sauce or tomato sauce, or pickles, etc. while still boiling...use a Pyrex container. You can tell if it worked or not by the lids popping as the ingredients cool.

I agree with the other person that said it's safer to do the water bath if you can't pour it really hot, but if you're aware of the popping seals and what the product should look like when uncanned, you're fine. We've had to discard very few jars over the years. And chili sauce is one of the recipes I make every year. Have you tried it on zucchini pie or with kielbasa...it's great (much less on a burger instead of ketchup).

Answer 2

I've been canning peppers for years. Three things to assure safety:

Sterilized jars, a cycle in the diswasher with heated drying does it. Don't touch the sealing surface on the lids or the jars.

Sterilized lids, boiling in a pot of water for 10 minutes will do it.

Hot vegetables, filling the jars to about 1/2 inch from the top. You need the trapped hot air, so that when it cools it contracts and snaps the lids down.

DO NOT store any jars on which the lids have not snapped down. You may eat the vegetables, but refrigerated, very soon, not after long storage.

Answer 3

If you are packing recipes while they are hot, sometimes as they cool the jars will seal. This isn't really scientific though (you don't know for sure whether they will seal or not) and definitely doesn't follow food safety guidelines. I would process the jars in the water bath, just to be on the safe side. It's easy to do, and you know the sauce will be safe. You can't be too careful when preserving foods.

Answer 4

Take the safe route...of 20 minutes bath...you don't wanna die from botulism. If you take the short cut you will have to freeze them. I freeze my pizza sauce in small jars and it works out fine.