Posted: 6/28/2010 8:04:31 PM EDT
|
Do I really need a water bath canner AND a pressure canner or can the latter pull double duty? I don't care if I need both, but I don't want to have to buy both if I don't have to. |
|
Quoted:
Do I really need a water bath canner AND a pressure canner or can the latter pull double duty? I don't care if I need both, but I don't want to have to buy both if I don't have to. You don't NEED both, but having a water bath canner will make your life easier and give you more consistent processing of your high acid foods. The rack that comes with a water bath canner gives you a place to park your jars as you fill them. You place the rack in the raised position and add the filled jars as they're ready. They're sitting in a bit of water which keeps them hot and out of the temperature "danger zone" for bacterial growth. When the rack's full and the water boiling, you lower the rack and all the jars start processing at the same time. After processing, you raise the rack and that brings all the jar lids out of the water at the same time eliminating "siphoning" which the phenomenon of a submerged, cooling jar sucking in a bit of water. It's not that a pressure canner bottom can't be pressed into service as a water bath vessel, it's just more cumbersome than using a canner made for water bath canning. Given that water bath canners are relatively inexpensive, I say: get both! 
|
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
You don't need a pressure canner if you just can vegetables and fruit. Nope, not true... veggies (other than high-acid tomatoes) need a pressure canner. Is that to say tomatoes cant be done in a pressure canner? C No, just that they don't require a pressure canner. Other vegetables, and even some low-acid varieties of tomatoes, need the higher temps a pressure canner produces to kill off all the nasties. Personally I vote for owning both. Anybody halfway serious about canning is going to eventually need a pressure canner, and even though a PC can serve as a WB canner (just don't clamp the lid down), it's way handier to have both on hand. As Feral mentioned, it's handy to use the WB canner to keep jars hot while you're filling up the PC. In general it's hard to have too many big pots around when canning! |
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
You don't need a pressure canner if you just can vegetables and fruit. Nope, not true... veggies (other than high-acid tomatoes) need a pressure canner. Is that to say tomatoes cant be done in a pressure canner? C No, just that they don't require a pressure canner. Other vegetables, and even some low-acid varieties of tomatoes, need the higher temps a pressure canner produces to kill off all the nasties. Personally I vote for owning both. Anybody halfway serious about canning is going to eventually need a pressure canner, and even though a PC can serve as a WB canner (just don't clamp the lid down), it's way handier to have both on hand. As Feral mentioned, it's handy to use the WB canner to keep jars hot while you're filling up the PC. In general it's hard to have too many big pots around when canning! The acidity of tomatoes can be raised by adding lemon or lime juice. |