Well, as far as the peppers are concerned, how about worrying about food poisoning?

Carol

The peppers are roasted and cold packed in oil,

No way!

Apples and peaches are acidic fruits. No added acid is required anyway. The pie fillings, assuming you followed the guidelines and used no thickeners other than Clear Jel, are no problem. If you used flour or corn starch then you're in trouble.

But in general it sounds like you are trying to close the barn door long after all the horses have fled and the barn has burned down so what kind of info are you looking for?

Why pressure canning? Why so long? Why at such a high pressure? What recipes were used?

No wonder the peaches were soft.

Dave

First, there is no such thing as "cold pack ". There is raw or hot pack.
Oil will allow botulism to grow. You need to dump those jars of food. There is a safe recipe for marinated peppers that is safe, but they are highly acidified.
You don't pressure can fruits unless you want mush.
Where are you getting the recipes for those things ?
I agree, if you used flour, tapioca, or anything else other than Clear jel you need to dump those jars, too.
Please, get yourself a new Ball Blue book and use it.

I also would not pressure can fruit. It's perfectly safe, I suppose, but unnecessary and as noted, will result in fruit mush. Fruits are acidic enough to be water bath canned with no additional acid.

The peppers are just scary, all food safety guidelines say you shouldn't can with oil, and especially low acid vegetables.

As noted, the fruit pie fillings will depend on the thickener. I do know some people who can pie filling with no thickener at all and if you did that, you're fine, but the fruit will still be mushy because of the pressure canning.

Annie

readinglady said: "Oil will allow botulism to grow."

...even after pressure canning? Doesn't PC (at the right pressure for the right amount of time) kill the botulism spores, preventing the release of toxin. If not, what's the purpose of pressure canning?

Don't misunderstand. I would not trust any of the products the OP made. I recommend discarding them as well. I ask only for my own clarification. I'm a "low pH" man myself *smile*.

Thanks,

Rick

..even after pressure canning? Doesn't PC (at the right pressure for the right amount of time) kill the botulism spores, preventing the release of toxin. If not, what's the purpose of pressure canning?

Oil is restricted because it coats and insultates the bacteria and spores preventing the heat from penetrating to kill it. It creates an anaerobic micro-environment around the spores that then allows growth and toxin production.

To kill c. botulium encased in oil the PC time would have to be so long and the pressure so high that the food would be destroyed.

By restricting the use of oil we can have food that is both safe and still looks like food. :)

Dave

Well, certainly on this thread I didn't say "Oil will allow botulism to grow."

The processing time for plain hot-pack peppers (i.e. no oil) is 35 minutes at 10psi or 15psi at altitude.

So if the OP is at altitude, his/her processing time is inadequate because it doesn't allow for the oil. At a lower altitude I have not a clue; I don't know of any data re peppers canned in oil one way or the other.

More accurately, oil does not allow botulism to grow. Oil encapsulates or enrobes the botulism spores, impeding the penetration of acid (if any is present, i.e. a marinated pepper recipe with insufficient acid to compensate) and heat. So it inhibits agents which can prevent the growth of botulism toxins.

But really, we're not eating the product; it's up to the individual processor to choose his/her methods and comfort level for risk.

We are not trying to be snarky or obstructive. We are not trying to be the canning police.

There are a lot of inexperienced home food preservers so unfamiliar with the issues they don't even know what questions to ask. They jump in with tremendous enthusiasm not realizing that the food safety dimensions of low-acid pressure canning are exponentially greater than those of conventional cookery.

Carol

Oh Carol, I'm so sorry for my incorrect reference to you in my post above.

I most likely did that because, in my mind, I was hoping you would respond to my question! lol

Anyway, thank you and thanks to all who answered. I knew oil was a no-no, but was curious about your thoughts on PC killing the spores.

Rick

It's not a problem, Rick.

Pressure canning will kill all the spores. But the amount of time required is the issue. Without testing there's just no way to know.

I suppose hypothetically (though this is still just a guess) it might be possible to can those peppers for the processing time of smoked salmon, which right now is the longest time I can think of.

One of the issues that doesn't come up very often but probably should is that tested processing times offer the best possible balance of safety and quality. If it's not possible to kill the spores while retaining a pleasing product, then the food is removed to the "not recommended" list.

Carol

Oil is thicker than water and takes longer for heat to penetrate. Plus, it coats the food particles and botulism spores can survive even pressure canning.

Ok, I posted a response a while back but for some reason it didn't take.

Regarding the corn starch, why is this a problem?

Regarding "cold packing" terminology, it is an acceptable term, but "raw packing" is more common.

Regarding the oil, why is this a problem? You can purchase all sorts of canned peppers in oil at the store, why would this be a problem at home?

I don't buy the "oil insulates" disease vectors line. Convection in the jar may be slower but 280 degrees is 280 degrees, especially if left at that temperature for a significant amount of time. I would not be comfortable with HWB only for oil canning, but pressure canning should be fine. A high temperature would not discriminate based on canning medium so long as it is equally heated throughout for the required length of time.

If someone has definitive proof (a study) that this is not the case, I would very much like to see it so that I can understand what is happening.

All in all, I was paranoid enough to throw everything in the freezer after it cooled once I finished reading all of the comments here, so no loss. I now have a half dozen jars of apple pie filling and a half dozen more of peaches and peppers safely in the chest freezer.

Your questions/issues are all ones that have been discussed and debated often here and in great detail. The search here will pull up those discussions for you if interested.

For any number of reasons, usually because they are new to home canning, there are always a few who seem to want to refute the scientific aspects of home canning because it differs from their personal beliefs or because they see it as "inconvenient" or it discourages what they want to do. Most home canners prefer to accept the science behind the guidelines and are thankful for it because we lack the funding, experience, education and equipment to dispute them. We take comfort from the fact that what we are canning is not only guaranteed safe for our family to eat but of high quality too.

So basically it boils down to your acceptance of or your rejection of the USDA/NCHFP guidelines, lab testing and supporting documentation. That documentation is all available on the web, most of it via the publications link at NCHFP. You are always free to reject it and take the associated risks. Most of us here much prefer NOT to do that.

Cornstarch is a thickener. Not only does it break down during processing and so affect quality but like any thickener, it retards heat penetration. The published processing times are not sufficient for using any thickeners other than Clear Jel. How much additional time would be required is a guess. You can choose to guess at it if you wish. That risk is yours to take. The simple solution is to can pie fillings without using ANY thickener and then add the thickener of choice after opening the jar at pie prep time.

The insulating properties of oil is well documented in science - even at the high school lab level. 280 degrees "may" be sufficient or it may not. There are studies in other venues that show viable cultures of many bacteria at much higher temperatures. But since we are using 240-250 degrees it isn't relevant. How much additional time and/or temp would be required has not been calculated because they would likely result in an inedible product. So NCHFP works to balance safety AND palatability.

As to what is available commercially vs. what can be done at home, that is an apples and oranges comparison. If the home canner had available irradiation equipment, high pressure autoclaves, pH calibration equipment and was willing to use all the disinfectants, additives, and preservatives used commercially then we too would be able to do many more things at home. We don't so we can't.

Hope this helps.

Dave

I do not appreciate the (seeming) insinuation that I'd rather stick my head in the sand than take good information. I'm not a troll looking for a fight. As you well know the internet is full of "truths" that are based on anecdotal information, at best, and flat out false at worst; so that's why I came here for information. I had used the search function, both here and Google, and I found conflicting information - along with 40+ pages here of completely unrelated information (perhaps the search engine here needs improvement) that I don't have luxury of time to sift through.

If I wasn't interested in advice I wouldn't have put my canned foods in the freezer after I read the warnings here so that I might enjoy my botox-laced pie filling later.

Thank you for posting some factual information rather than just another generic "you can't do that" statement, I will dig deeper into the studies, and I now have a better understanding of differences between home and commercial canning.

I do not appreciate the (seeming) insinuation that I'd rather stick my head in the sand than take good information. I'm not a troll looking for a fight.

Did not intend to insinuate that at all so my apologies.

Please understand that we regularly get flame posts here from folks who deny any validity to the guidelines simply because they are government based. Or they argue that the guidelines are stupid because they discredit the way grandma did it. Or they want to debate the underlying science with us who never claim to be food scientists rather than going to the source. And yes, we do get trolls too - far too often.

I suppose that tends to make me at least a bit defensive now and then and while I try to keep that out of my posts I'm not always successful.

So for source information there is none better than NCHFP.

Dave