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miz_p

does a little bit of butter mean no canning my soup??

Miz.P
10 years ago

Sugar.. you guys never talk about sugar in your soup..

ok, I shouldn't say never.. I only read the one thread from '06 about canning any soup .. which ended with rogue canner johndeergirl going off to can pasta/ meatloaf supprise...
but I need some help.. fairly new to canning, did alright with the jam & jelly stuff, got a pressure canner, I am a bit gun shy on that..

the post I was reading told someone that using 3Tbs of butter & 1/2 cup oil was enough to make it unfit for canning due to fat encapsulating ickys ..

I have a garden tomato soup that comes entirely from store bought cans except for the 2 onions I sauteed in about 2Tbs butter & 2ish Tbs olive oil.. does this make it a freezer only batch??
and .. well I put sugar in everything (makes up for the tonic I don't drink) .. this batch of almost 2 gal has about 3cups sugar..
I'm taste testing it at a pritty good clip but there is going to be enough to can .. if I should be able to, would I be able to use water bath? in reality there is a lot less sugar than in the jam .. but now I'm worried about the butter.. I was planning on water bath for 30 to 40 minutes ...
advice please :)

Comments (7)

  • digdirt2
    10 years ago

    Well this isn't going to be what you want to hear I'm sorry. The good news is sugar is no issue in canning.

    The bad news is two-fold. One, first rule of safe home canning - You can't can your own personal recipes.

    This is your own made-up recipe, never tested, never approved, unknown pH, unknown density, unknown processing required (you are just guessing), etc. Such recipes are never recommended for any kind of canning.

    Second, yes, except in the few tested recipes where some oils are approved, the additions of fats is restricted/prohibited. This is because the fats coat any bacteria present and prevent the heat from killing them.

    So can you can this soup? Your choice. It would not be possible per the safe-canning guidelines. It would be a frozen recipe. But the choice remains yours, it is your risk to take. But I will add that if you choose to can it then pressure canning would be recommended, not BWB, because it is a low-acid recipe.

    Dave

  • Miz.P
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    thank you so much Dave.. the good news is I can keep my soup in the crowded freezer and i will be able to eat it without getting sick!
    & I learned ..
    now for the dumb question.. do I have to follow the exact recipes for chutney, jams and jelly's too or is there some leeway for the direction challenged ??
    thank you again.. and I'm very happy to have found this forum .. well done.
    Lin

  • digdirt2
    10 years ago

    Pickled items like chutneys and other pickles and high acid fruit recipes like jams and jellies (some low acid fruit exceptions) allow for some leeway but not just "anything goes" even with them.

    For example with pickled foods, there are minimal amounts of vinegar or other acids required and the proportions of acidic to low acid ingredients has to be maintained.

    For tomatoes, since they are borderline they usually require some form of added acid.

    For jelly and jam the only concern is the few low-acid fruits.

    Our standard recommendation here for those new to canning is to use only tested and approved recipes - there are 1000's of them available - OR get some training in certified canning classes.

    Hope this helps.

    Dave

  • myfamilysfarm
    10 years ago

    I'll chime in on the jams/jellies. Ball has a pectin calculator that allows some leeway in regards to the amount of sugar needed to gel. I have it saved as a favorite on my computer. Don't mess around with the acid/pectin tho, learn from my mistakes.

  • Miz.P
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    Thank you so much for following up with what must be the gazillionth time you've had to tell someone to follow the recipes ..
    :)

    my brother has a star fruit tree which is way too productive for one person to keep up with!.. I had been using a dehydrator most of last year and finally made some chutney, i followed the recipe because i did not know what chutney was.. its a strange sweet pickle thing.. I've since found out..
    This year I decided to try the jam.. I mixed some other fruit in with the star fruit and boiled it down, i did not add pectin, i likely used extra sugar. The recipe i was "going by" called for too much cinnamon because when i shared some with friends the next day they were polite but "eh" .. I had the same reaction and have had the case of BWB jars on the counter for 2 or 3 weeks to use as a base for the next jam adventure, figuring that if i didn't put in any cinnamon then it would turn out better. Can I still do that? It would mean everything would get boiled for the day; I'm not quick and it somehow takes me that long to make a batch.

    The only other things I have tried are the fruit leather, again with the recipe because I didn't know what it was, and it is living in the fridge; and I have found out fruit is preserved in jars with booze as long as the alcohol content is over 85 proof.. I have a LOT of that in jars in the garage, its a fast way to do something with the fruit. My idea was to strain them in May (star fruit brother's birthday) because it's supposed to give you yummy vodka after about 4 months, and then I could use the fruit to make chutney or jam at that time.
    Maybe I should stick to dehydrate and alcohol preserving?
    Maybe I should take up drinking fruity alcohol instead of canning?

    I had gotten a pressure canner, I had hoped to can soups. I have a chicken soup started, so far its just boiled chicken and water. I put soups in the fridge so the fat jells at the top and is easy to skim off, but I will to look into some recipes before I start any meat canning..

    I have always been able to eat most anything, however I recently poisoned myself for the first time. I make yogurt with one of the home machines, I had a batch in the fridge, which I keep at just under freezing, and I lost track of when I made it because the house flooded which took all of my time for weeks. I when i was mixing the yogurt with some whip cream & jam, (which i put in to the little gram-cracker crumb pie's you get at the store, and I freeze) i tasted it with my pinky finger, like you do, and a few hours later I was the sickest I've ever been in my life.Threw out all the little frozen pies. and got cautious..

    so the only question now is: can i use the cinnamon jam in another batch?

    And are you all going to try the yogurt/ whip cream / jam pies, which work with store yogurt?

  • digdirt2
    10 years ago

    1) the star fruit - since it such an unusual fruit, rarely used, AFAIK there are no tested/approved recipes for its use. The problem with it is the very wide range of pH.

    The pH of the fruit slightly increased with the advancement in maturity. Ripe fruits were significantly
    less acidic (pH 4.82) than green young fruits (pH 3.43) and half ripe fruits (pH 3.56).

    So the ripe fruits would be considered a low-acid fruit for canning purposes and would require the addition of acid - usually bottled lemon juice - to be safe for canning in any form. The amount of sugar used isn't a safety issue, it is a quality issue.

    The closest comparison would be the recipes for figs and mangoes which always call for using under-ripe fruits and adding up to 1/4 c of bottled lemon juice to make it safe for shelf storage.

    2) canning soups have very specific guidelines on ingredients and density. It has what is called the 1/2 and 1/2 rule meaning each jar must be no more than 1/2 solids and the remainder liquids.

    3) meats also have very specific preparation guidelines for canning.

    I'm going to suggest you spend some time reviewing all the guidelines at NCHFP, the recognized authority on home canning practices. Linked it for you below. NCHFP and the Ball Blue Book of Canning and the Ball Complete Book of Home Food Preservation are the primary sources of recipes and instructions for 90% of all home canning.

    NCHFP also offers a free online basic canning course you can enroll in.

    Dave

    Here is a link that might be useful: NCHFP - National Center for Home Food Preservation

  • Miz.P
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    thank you much Dave. I do have a couple of different copies of the Ball Blue book and have been looking at them. I didn't get any sense of the pH issues, seemed more towards the sterilize issue but they likely thought folks were going to actually follow their recipes, which i will learn to do.
    you are right about no recipes for star fruit. I did put in lemon juice and i mixed it with pineapple and mackintosh apples. i think i went with a kumquat thing for a reference. i see now that i really need to learn the science of the food preservation art before i do any more canning, i will read up at the NCHFP site.
    thank you so much for your time. i hope that you try the yogurt thing, its all i have to offer since the chocolate chip cookie fax machine isn't here yet :)
    have a great night and thank you
    Lin