Canning Dry Beans

I've posted before about cooking dry beans (primarily pinto, but my favorite is cranberry).  Beans keep a long time when dry, but they eventually become difficult to cook; the solution that has worked best for me is pressure cooking.

Another alternative is to can them.  Now that I'm using my pressure canner, that is an option.  Canning beans offers no advantage over storing dry with the exception that they are ready to eat without further preparation.  Canned beans certainly won't last longer than dry beans in terms of storage life (the latter are good for 30 years, if "dislike slightly" is good enough).

There are numerous sites that describe canning beans, but one thing is striking: most describe canning plain beans.  The NCHFP does have a recipe for canning beans with tomato or molasses sauce that optionally includes adding a small amount of bacon or pork.  As I've noted previously, when making a pot of beans for immediate use (or for freezing) I add onion, garlic, and bacon to the mix.

I decided to give my normal recipe a try.  The amount of bacon per jar would be comparable to that suggested by the NCHFP site, although my precise recipe isn't listed--the one featuring the bacon includes tomato or molasses, which is not the flavor I was going for at all (I cut up a pound of bacon for the batch, which worked out to about one ounce per jar--somewhat more than the 3/4 inch cube in the NCHFP recipe).

The NCHFP site recommends an overnight or quick soak, followed by 30 minutes' worth of boiling before putting in the jars.  The extra boiling might be justified if it helps the beans absorb more water so that they are fully hydrated.  But that level of cooking obviously isn't needed for tenderness: the beans process for 75-90 minutes at 240 degrees.  That cooks them very well.

I soaked three pounds of cranberry beans overnight, then poured off the water and added the onion, garlic, and bacon, placing them straight into the jars--similar to the process suggested by The Prairie Homestead.

I had some fresh onion, but not enough for the whole batch, so I hydrated some dried minced onion, following the process previously described.  Then it was just a matter of filling the jars, first with beans, then with water, to about the 1" of headspace line.

The NCHFP suggests 5 pounds of beans for 7 quarts (or 14 pints); The Prairie Homestead got more than 1 pound in each quart jar.  But these recipes don't include the onion or bacon.  I ended up with about 17 pints' worth of bean mix.  This was somewhat unfortunate, because my All American 921 canner cannot hold that many widemouth jars (various sites indicate the capacity is 19 pints, but that is based on standard-mouth jars, which are narrower--relatively few sites break the capacity down by different jar types, but those that do suggest the max capacity with widemouths is 16 pints).  In the picture, you'll see that I had one standard-mouth jar.  As I kept filling and filling and filling...I realized I was going to need all the space I had and then some.  Unfortunately, I could only find one empty standard-mouth jar.  I mostly use widemouths, though I have a number of standard-mouth jars--they were just all full of peach and blueberry preserves.   I was only able to get 15 jars into the canner, 7 below and 8 on top.

I processed them for about 80 minutes at 10 pounds.  When they came out of the canner, it was obvious they'd leaked a little, but not much: the water in the bottom of the canner looked (very) slightly cloudy and the jars had some fat-slickness to them.

After they cooled down, the liquid level inside the jars did recede quite a bit--In this case, I don't think it was all leakage, because all of the jars were low and there was nowhere near that amount in the bottom of the canner.  I think the fluid level dropped simply due to it being absorbed by the beans.  Although some of the beans appear to be high and dry in the picture, they are still tender (and cooked to perfection).

I'll probably still mostly cook beans for immediate use going forward, occasionally freezing one or two meals' worth.  However, canning does expand the opportunity to use them. Cooking a batch of beans is a big endeavor, and I don't always have the time when I would otherwise eat some.  Now I have them if I want them.  One pint is about the right quantity for one meal.

"Finger Tight"

Most canning tutorials say that bands should be put on "finger tight" before loading into the canner. That's somewhat vague and qualitative.  As I have noted (more than once), I've historically had a problem getting the right tension.  With water bath canning I eventually just started tightening them pretty tight--call it firm--and dealt with the occasional creased lids.

Even with creased lids, I have almost always gotten a decent seal, and on the exceedingly rare occasion where a jar either hasn't sealed or the seal has later failed, it hasn't been on a creased lid (this is except for the reusable lids, which I have now completely abandoned--anybody want a case of them?).

Back to what in the world finger-tight means.  When I started pressure canning, I didn't want to tighten the jar lids too much, but was somewhat nonplussed at how loose I should make them.  I found this video at the Lehman's site which quantifies how far to tighten the bands:  Screw them on until first resistance, then about one inch further.  That's what I have done for the pressure canning and it has worked (although it's apparent there is some trace leakage from the jars...the residual water in the canner has a somewhat broth-like aroma).  The overall jar fluid level seems to have been okay (but one could ask how much higher it might have been if the jars had been tighter).

This PDF (also written up here) by Frances L. Reasonover of Texas A&M suggests that in a pressurized canner, leakage should be impossible--and, indirectly, indicates why the canner should be allowed to cool naturally (a point also made in the video above).  if the weight is released when the contents of the jars are still too hot, the pressure inside the jars will force an overflow.

In the pressure canner I usually haven't had overflow, but I have found that the contents of my jars are still boiling after the pressure drops to zero--and this continues for some time after they are put on the counter to cool.  The remaining water in the canner does have signs of a small amount of fluid leakage, and when I did a batch of pinto beans, it was apparent most jars had experienced a slight overflow during processing.  However, one thing I have not (so far) seen with the pressure canner is jars overflowing as they cool--this has on occasion happened when canning acid foods, mostly fruit in syrup (even with very tight bands). That might have been because I removed them from the water too soon.

Steaming Eggs

I have had some trouble hard-boiling eggs.  Eggs that are relatively fresh can be hard to peel.  One solution is to age them, but then they lose nutrients.  My solution for years has been to hold them for a while, then boil.  So far, I haven't had any go bad, but I have had a couple float.  I have tossed those.

One solution that I've seen a few places, such as The Prairie Homestead, is to steam them (I used to have an electric egg cooker that did the same thing; my parents had a Jurassic one that probably dated to the 1960s).  Generally the instructions for stovetop steaming call for atmospheric steaming for 20 minutes (i.e., non-pressurzied, although The Prairie Homestead has directions for pressure cooking them in the shell via Instant Pot, too).

I decided to give this a try.  I got a set of steamers cheap off Amazon, then loaded the eggs into the pot.  I was able to make them in the same pot with the same quantity that I usually use.

I had a hunch that they would need less than 20 minutes; Jill Winger is at over 6000 feet in elevation.  However, for the first try, I steamed them for 20.

After boiling, I typically quench them with cold water, to which I have added ice.  That was still doable, although ice cube placement was more tricky with the steamer.

The verdict:  early indications are that it works as well as advertised.  The first half dozen peeled beautifully, although the yolks were a bit over-done.  I eventually determined that 10 minutes at under 1000 feet of elevation worked fine. Nine minutes is okay, too, but some of the yolks are a little doughy (which can be good or bad depending on what you like).  This should've been obvious at the outset based on the data from atmospheric steam canning: steam times are the same as boiling times (a point also made by Lisa Steele recently at Fresh Eggs Daily). I had settled on about 8:45 for boiled eggs after experimentation.

Steaming does not guarantee success.  Some eggs still are hard to peel (though not many, about ten percent in my limited experience so far), and I have had one egg break while steaming--though this happens with boiling, too, with about the same likelihood (so far I have had 1 of 35 or so break).

So steaming definitely seems superior to boiling in most respects.  It'll be the method I use going forward.

More Whole Wheat...

I've posted a few times about successes baking with 100% whole wheat flour.  It's definitely different from white flour, and I don't do it that often.  However, every couple of months I find myself baking with it again.  White whole wheat is pretty easy to eat, though still dense; a 100% loaf with red wheat is intense.

I used to use vital wheat gluten, but haven't put that into my loaves in the last couple of years. It helps somewhat, but not all that much.

My most recent effort was in mid-May, with white wheat.  Although it was a cool early May (with a near-freezing low the second week), the house temps had warmed to the low 70s, allowing the overnight rise to accomplish something without supplemental heat.

The crust actually broke along the top.  This very rarely happens with 100% whole wheat (at least for me).  While this was a nice surprise, it's still a pretty dense loaf:

I still stick with about 3 3/4 cups of flour per loaf, 1/4 cup of sourdough starter, and 1/2 teaspoon of salt; the amount of water varies according to the flour mix and coarseness of the whole wheat, but is usually about 1 2/3 cups.  This mix with whole wheat leads to about 1/2 cup of whole wheat flour per two slices, or 200 calories, 32 net grams of carbs and 8 grams of fiber (according to the Fat Secret site).  That's pretty decent.

Canning Beef

As I noted a few weeks ago, I've canned some chicken.  After years of dreading using the pressure canner, I finally hauled it out and learned that it wasn't at all bad.  With the sporadic meat supply in the spring of 2020, canning it seems like a good approach rather than relying on same-day purchase (freezing is another option, but apparently everyone had the same idea and freezers sold out, so unless the capacity was on hand in early 2020, it wasn't an option).

I decided to try beef next.  I've bought canned roast beef before, and it has ranged from dreadful to not bad. Commercially-canned beef is a bit hard to find now, too, and its cost is comparable to home-canned...with the right kind of beef.  This obviously isn't an exercise to undertake with ribeye steaks or tenderloins. Chuck roast seemed like a reasonable cut to try.

I got two different three-pound roasts and cut them up.  The cutting process took about 45 minutes or so; I used an approach similar to that for making bread cubes for stuffing.  I just cut the meat into reasonable-sized pieces.

As the picture shows, the beef was seamed with fat.  I also trimmed some solid fat off.

As with the chicken, I got a little over 13 ounces in each jar; after accounting for the removed fat, I ended up with 7 jars--one of those had only 12 ounces in it.

The processing time was the same as for chicken--75 minutes, but I stretched it to 80.  After taking them out of the canner, they were seriously cooked (the short one is on the far right).

As they cooled, they all compressed down somewhat, and the fat visible at the top congealed.

I broke one open a few days later to try it.  It wasn't bad, but also wasn't good enough to justify 3x the cost of chicken breast.  If you have your own side of beef to process, it makes sense.  Otherwise, maybe not so much.

Cold Damage

My part of north Georgia had a couple of late freezes--the last was April 15/16.  Both were pretty marginal; the one the night of April 15 just touched 32 degrees and did not stay there long--about an hour.  The earlier one the week before dropped the temp to 29.

That's only about three or four degrees above the blueberry killer of 2017, but those few degrees really matter.  My blueberries this time around suffered no damage--they're supposed to be hardy to about 28.  The only plant that suffered at all was a new fig that's still in the pot.

The morning after the frost, some of the leaves looked like they'd been damaged.

Over the next few days the withered parts of leaves completely died.

It's no big deal; most leaves were okay and in any case, it'll put out new leaves to replace those that were lost.

Early spring freezing on new growth isn't the same as whatever has caused some other figs to die--one was lost when it was still leafed out in early November and got hit with a low 20s freeze.  Others have gone dormant and never recovered.  But spring vulnerability is an issue with figs.  It's usually not fatal.

Return of the Chuck-Will's-Widows

They're back.  As I wrote a couple of years ago, Chuck-will's-widows are migratory nightjars that are present throughout the south during the spring and summer.  In my old exurb-that-became-a-suburb, they became less common and finally disappeared over the 20 years that I lived there.  Development pushed them out--they won't call from underneath a tree in a supermarket parking lot; they need large swaths of forest.

I now live again in a place where they sing throughout the spring, so all is well on that count.  One thing that has surprised me, however, is learning how spotty they can be, even in good habitat.  I can always hear them in the back of the house, but out in the front by the road, not so much (this is true even without traffic).  There are areas nearby that are teeming with them, and other areas nearby where they cannot be heard at all.

I don't know what their status as a species is: the Cornell University site cites data suggesting that their numbers may have declined 70% over the 50 years between 1966 and 2015.  In some areas they have been all but eliminated--such as my former neighborhood--but that population may have simply shifted elsewhere.  Tree cover in the Southeast may or may not be down...but it may well be that the type of cover they want is lower now than it was back in 1966.  Individual trees or small isolated copses won't get it done for them.

I'm glad they're in my new neighborhood.  I hope they stay.