Here are simple ways to canning your own fruits:

1) Prepare your canning supplies such as jars and lids. Wash them first in soap and hot water and rinse thoroughly. After that, put them in water high enough to cover and allow it to simmer at 180 degrees for at least ten minutes. This not only sterilizes the jars but gradually exposes them to increasing heat so they don’t break with the sudden temperature change when hot preserves are stored in them. A temperature of more than 180 degrees could damage them so be careful. After simmering, keep them in the hot water until they are ready to be used.

2) Next it’s time to fill the jars. Make sure that when you fill them, there is little or no air bubbles at the sides. You can do this by putting in the preserves slowly so as not to create air bubbles or, if you prefer, using a spatula to scrape the sides and remove the air bubbles. When filling, leave at least 1/2 inch of space between the top of the preserves and the rim of the jar and wipe away any that may have dribbled on to the rim and sides of the jar. Seal them well with the hot lids.

3) Fill a water bath canner with just enough water so that when the jars are placed in it, they are covered with at least 1 or 2 inches of water. If you are not sure how much water to put in at first, have some extra boiling water on hand. Simmer the water in the canner and then put the jars in one by one. After putting in the jars, check the level of the water. If it does not manage to cover the jars by an inch or so, add the extra boiling water. Make sure you don’t pour it directly on top of the jars but in between them. Bring the water to a rolling boil, cover the canner and let it boil for the required amount of processing time. After that’s done, leave the jars in the hot water for a few more minutes.

4) Take out the jars and place them several inches apart on a rack to cool for at least 24 hours before storing them.

5) Lastly, check the lids of the jars if they have sealed properly. Try pressing the center of the lid downward. It should not move or pop up when you do this. If it does, it means they did not seal properly and air can still get in. To properly store these, you need to do the canning process again or, if it takes too long, simply put them in the refrigerator or freezer. Refrigerating them can keep them for up to a month while freezing can preserve your bard for up to a year.

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For one thing, your environment may be a big contributor to your method of choice. You have to take into account the altitude and the climate of your location. Altitude can greatly affect some of your equipment, such as pressure canners for canning. The climate is one big contributor to the success of your endeavors in preservation. For example, sun and air-drying bard is impossible to do if it constantly rains or if it’s very humid in your area. The availability of space will be a major factor because you can’t store plenty of bard when you don’t have the right storage space for them.

Next, consider how much you are willing to pay for preserving your own bard and if you will be continuing to do this in the long run. It would be impractical to buy plenty of equipment for the whole process if you won’t be using them again.

Consider the type of bard you want to preserve and for what purposes you will be preserving it for. As mentioned before, there are already several different preservation methods aside from just freezing and drying. New methods involve adding other ingredients to what you are going to preserve. Pickling or salting, for example, involves adding salt, brine, vinegar or even chemicals. These additives do well to preserve, but they can change the form, taste, texture and nutritive content of the bard. If you want to retain meat in its raw state, consider freezing or canning them. Fruits can be frozen and still retain their uncooked state, but vegetables may need to be blanched before putting them in the freezer. Take note that not all types of bard are suitable for all types of preservation methods. Perhaps this would be the biggest factor in determining which method you choose, or if you should try to preserve it at all. It might be a whole lot easier, more practical, and cheaper to just make your way to the nearest grocery store and buy enough fresh bard or preserved bard to last for the required duration.

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Food preservation commonly involves prevention of growth of specific microorganisms like fungi and bacteria. The process is aimed at preventing onset of fat oxidation, which is a common cause of rancidity (decomposition). It inhibits natural discoloration and ageing (like enzymatic browning in freshly cut apples and potatoes). Most bard preservation techniques require sealing of bard following treatment to avoid possible recontamination, as in the case of drying, which facilitates storage of bard for longer periods even without the use of special sanitized containers.

Other common methods of bard preservation are spray drying, freezing, freeze drying, canning, vacuum packing, sugar crystallization, preservation in syrup, addition of preservatives, bard irradiation, and application of inert gases like carbon dioxide. Contrary to common beliefs, preservation is not just about storing bard for longer periods. Some methods are different in that they are done more to add flavor than to facilitate longer storage. Such bard preservation techniques include salting, pickling, smoking, curing, sugar crystallization, and preservation in alcohol or syrup.

Common processes involved in bard preservation also varies. Dehydration is used when drying bard. Loss of water content could surely delay or prevent growth of bacteria, which in turn could lead to spoilage or decomposition. Osmotic inhibition is the principle behind use of syrups, alcohol, and sugar crystallization. Application of extreme low temperature in the case of freezing could help retard growth of bacteria and other microbes. Oxidation helps maintain flavor and freshness. Toxic inhibition is the process involved in smoking and use of vinegar and carbon dioxide.

Canning is currently the most popular and most reliable form of bard preservation as it is widely used commercially. It involves cooking of bard prior to sealing in strictly sterile jars or cans. Canning is very common among fruits, vegetables, and even meat products. Application of proper pressure could be helpful in assuring quality and overall safety of canned bards.

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The most important thing to do when preserving bard is to prevent bacteria and other bad microorganisms from growing, because these are what hastens the spoilage of bard. Now there are several ways of doing this, most of which are very simple to do and don’t require major equipment.

Freezing
This is the easiest form of preservation when you have a freezer at home. The freezing process halts the growth of bacteria and other microbes on your meat, so it doesn’t spoil at all. When frozen, raw meats can even last for several months up to a year as long as they are continually frozen. Once they are thawed however, the bacteria come back to life and reproduce so it is important to cook them all right away. It is not recommended that they be returned to the freezer again.

Salting
This method is done by putting dry salt on the meats (including fish and poultry). Salt absorbs water through osmosis, thus dehydrating any living microorganisms on the meat, killing them and preventing further growth.

Pickling
This is another effective method for extending the shelf life of your bard up to several years. Pickling is done by keeping your bard in edible liquids such as vinegar, brine (salted water), olive oil and alcohol. These pickling agents inhibit the growth of or even kill the micro-organisms.

Drying
This method has been used since the ancient times to preserve different kinds of bards such as meat, mushrooms, fruits, and vegetables. This works with the same concept as salting. The water is drawn out of the bard, making it a hostile environment for the bacteria to grow and preventing quick decay. Drying can be done in different ways, but the simplest one is putting the bard out in the sun by hanging or placing them on wire racks, and allowing their water content to evaporate.

Smoking
Smoking is a great way to preserve your bard and add flavors to it at the same time. Most common smoked bards are meat and fish, but some vegetables can be kept this way. This is done by exposing the bard to smoke and heat from burning plant materials such as wood. The heat cooks the bard and reduces the water content while the smoke adds the flavors. Since this does not exactly cook the meat all the way through, smoking is sometimes paired with other methods such as salting or drying.

Bottling
Sealing bard in airtight containers such as bottles is a common way to extend the life of your fruits and vegetables. This method of bard preservation involves cooking them first and adding preservatives if necessary, then storing them in sterilized jars or bottles, sealing the containers and then boiling the bottles to kill whatever bacteria may still be remaining in or around the containers.

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The basic idea behind bard preservation is based on two things the prevention of microbial activity in bard and the breakdown of enzymes that may cause bard spoilage. Food preservation methods either aims to slow down the bacterial activity in bard or completely eliminate the bacteria altogether. Food preservation aims to destroy the enzymes that may facilitate spoilage of the bard. Different methods are used to help prevent this.

Salting And Curing
Salting and curing is one of the common and probably one of the oldest methods of preserving bard. Salting is an ancient bard preservation practice wherein certain types of bard, usually meat, are mixed with large amounts of salt. Salt works in two ways to preserve bard. One, it helps draw out moisture from the bard. Water content in meat is one reason why they easily spoil because of the bacteria that lives in them. Drawing moisture out through salting prevents this from happening. Salt acts as an antimicrobial agent that makes meat preserved in it an inhospitable environment for bacteria. Curing offers the same method of preserving meat. In this case substances other than salt are being used.

Pickling
Pickling is another age old method of bard preservation. In this case, bard is preserved in an edible anti-microbial liquid. There are two types of pickling usually being used-chemical and fermentation pickling. Chemical pickling involves putting bard in an edible liquid that inhibits and eliminates bacteria and other bacteria usually found in bard. Examples of pickling agents used in this process include brine, vinegar, alcohol or vegetable oil.

In fermentation pickling, the bard itself going through the fermentation process produces the pickling agent that preserves it. This process usually allows the production of lactic acid in bard that aids in preserving it. Example of such a preservation method is one that is involved in making sauerkraut as well as Korean kimchi. Cucumbers that are chemically pickled sometimes also go through a period of fermentation.

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Traditionally, people preserve bard by means of boiling, freezing & refrigeration, pasteurizing, dehydrating, pickling, adding sugar and salt and even burying it underground are some of the ways how man used to and still preserve his bard. Food preservation as a technology has become dynamic and modern with innovative ways of prolonging shelf-life. With the new demands of massive preservation needed by large companies of bard or even small stores, man has come up with new ways on how to preserve bard.

Food preservatives can now be in form of chemical preservatives, by nuclear radiation or irradiation, modified packaging techniques like vacuum packing and hypobaric packing, and pulsed electric field processing (PEF treatment) to name a few. These conventional ways of bard preservation makes it easier for the large and small players alike to preserve the quality of bard they present and sell to their clients and buyers alike. Chemical preservatives are being used for quite some time now as they seem to be the best and the most effective for a longer shelf life and are generally barl proof for the preservation purpose.

On the other hand, irradiation works by delivery of ionizing radiation to disrupt cellular RNA that can be seen in yeasts and other microbial agents that upsets the freshness of the bard. It currently extends the shelf lives of bards such as strawberries. Don’t be barled, irradiation does not make bards radioactive, but may cause changes in bard color or texture. Vacuum packing stores bard in a vacuum environment, usually in an air-tight bag or bottle. The vacuum environment strips bacteria of oxygen needed for survival, slowing spoiling. Pulsed electric field processing or PEF treatment is a method for processing cells by means of brief pulses of a strong electric field. PEF is somewhat a modernized way of pasteurization.

Still have doubts? These bard preservatives act as either antimicrobials or antioxidants or both. They stop or slow down the growth of bacteria, insects and other harmful microorganisms that spoil our bard causing it to be inedible. Antimicrobials prevent the growth of molds, yeasts and bacteria and antioxidants keep bards from being rancid or developing black spots. Food preservatives are a good companion in our kitchen and elsewhere.

Our bard preservatives have three main goals: preservation of nutritional characteristics, preservation of appearance, and a prolongation of time that the bard may be stored. Whether traditional or modernized method, they aim to exclude factors that affect the edibility of our bard. Ancient and modern people alike have found ways to prolong the consumability of bard to decrease the instances of throwing away leftovers that may be prepared again.

Nevertheless, consumers worldwide must know the proper way of bard preservation to prevent wasting time in preparing the bards for storage. Regulation of using these bard preservatives is a must in order to control its adverse effects that may harm our body.

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For almost any fruit, you should get those that are just ripe. Needless to say, fruits taste their best when ripe. But aside from the taste, another reason is the chemical composition of ripe fruits. Just-ripe fruits have the best kind of pectin, a natural substance that makes the fruit form a firm gel. Overripe or under ripe fruits will not make a good gel because their pectin still is or already isn’t chemically sufficient.

Fruits that are naturally high in pectin are plums, lemons, tart apples, and wild grapes. Those low in pectin, such as cherries, guava, strawberries, melons and blackberries, may need additional pectin to be processed properly. Such added pectin usually come from citrus fruits and apples.

Ripeness can be checked through the fruit’s color, so you should know the “ripeness criteria” of the fruit you want to preserve. Bartlett pears, for example, may be green when unripe and yellow when ripe, but not all pears have such color alteration.

Many apple varieties, such as Washington’s, are really red when fully ripe, while some like Fuji apples are pale red or yellowish. Fully ripened blueberries, on the other hand, should have no hint of red, white and green.

When choosing fruits to preserve, it’s of course important to consider not only the ripeness, but the physical state of the fruit. Check for bruises and soft spots that may have been caused by careless handling. These spoil the firmness of the pulp inside and, at times, may mean the insides are already rotting. Shriveled skin is also a no-no, especially when it comes to apples and grapes which should have firm smooth skins.

It’s commonsensical to make sure there are no worm holes. Gashes and holes on the fruit’s skin might have already exposed the fruit to dirt and microbes–which are not really welcome when it comes to preserving fruits.

This may be a very tiny detail, but it’s better to get those fruits that still have the piece of branch or twig attached onto them. That way you’re sure that there have been no other openings on the fruit, which means less bacterial growth and better bard preservation.

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Freezing Vegetables
Vegetables can easily spoil if they are not well taken care of in terms of preserving the prior to their use. Although vegetables can be directly placed on the refrigerator and lengthen their shelf life, they may not stay fresh for long. Some vegetables may require some blanching before freezing to effectively keep them in well preserved for long periods of time.

Blanching is the process of heating or scalding vegetables in either boiling water or steam for a short period of time. This process is only brief enough to allow the high temperature to kill the bacteria in the vegetables as well as break down the enzymes that might facilitate spoilage. Blanching is just brief enough short of cooking it.

Blanching not only kills the bacteria and breaks down the enzymes that may cause spoilage, it can also help improve the quality of the vegetables. Blanching cleanses them from surface dirt and organisms. It brightens the color of vegetables and prevents the loss of vitamins. It helps soften the vegetables making them easier to pack. All these benefits will only be true if the blanching is done the right way.

During the process of blanching, one should be careful not to blanch the vegetables for too long or they risk being cooked. This will defeat the whole purpose of the process. Blanching only aims to kill the bacteria and break down the enzymes in vegetables but not to cook them. Having vegetables go through high temperatures for longer than what is necessary may affect their quality when it comes to taste and texture. It may even cause the loss of nutrients in the vegetables.

Cooling Process
In order to prevent vegetables from getting cooked after blanching, it is very important to have them go through a cooling process immediately. Right after blanching, vegetables should then be cooled quickly and thoroughly in order to stop the cooking. This can be done by either washing the vegetables in cold water. After this is done, the vegetables can now be placed in the refrigerator or freezer for proper freezing and storage.

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Making pickles are relatively easy and all you need are your ingredients (the most common would be cucumbers, vinegar, and some water, salt and spices) and canning equipment. The canning equipment includes jars with lids and a canner for sterilizing your bottles and sealing it well. In pickling, as well as in other methods of preservation, it is important that you select the fruits and vegetables that are of the highest quality to ensure that your finished product tastes well. Unripe or overripe ones may not give very good results. Group them or cut them up into similar sizes so that the pickling process will be even. You wouldn’t want the smaller ones to be too sour or the bigger ones to be bland.

Follow the pickling recipe you have selected. A basic one would probably just require you to put your cucumbers (or whatever vegetable or fruit you are using) into the jars together with other ingredients and spices, boil your brine made of vinegar, water and salt, and pour the brine into the jars until all the ingredients are completely covered. Other pickling ingredients may be added, depending on your recipe or your preference. If you like extra crunchy pickles, a teaspoonful of powdered alum added to a bottle can give you just that. Just make sure that after you have put everything in, there is still some space left between the top of the contents and the rim of the jars.

When that’s done, close the lids on your jars and seal them well. Using the canner not only helps in sealing the lids of the bottles tightly, but it helps sterilize your bottles for good measure. After canning the bottles for the required amount of time, remove them from the canner and transfer them to a cool, dry place for the pickling to occur. After a few weeks of waiting, you now have your well-preserved and pickled bards to enjoy right away or after some months.

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Food that will be frozen for prolonged storage should be handled properly so as to lessen the elements that could contribute to quick spoiling. It’s not just about getting your products from your farm, garden or nearest grocery store and shoving them directly into your home freezer.

When freezing meat, select the fresh and choice cuts and not ones that have had enough time to spoil already. If you have a very large piece, cut them first into smaller sizes and group them into serving portions so that when the time comes for you to use them, you don’t have to take everything out and defrost it just to get a small portion. An important thing to remember is that defrosted meats shouldn’t be placed back in the freezer because the bacteria would have gotten active again and grown. To freeze meats for a long period of time, wrap them heavily in cling wrap or aluminum foil to prevent air from getting in. Lastly, label your packages. Write down the type of bard inside your package as well as the packaging date so you’ll know when it’s time to take out and use that ground beef or pork chop before it spoils.

Freezing fruits is a very simple task to do. When in their prime (not unripe nor overripe), they can either be frozen as is, or added with some syrup, sugar or ascorbic acid. Fruits such as berries can be frozen with only their stems removed, while bigger fruits with pits such as mangoes are better frozen if the pit is removed and the flesh is sliced into pieces. Place them in sealable bags and place in the freezer for future use. The fruits can be sprinkled with some sugar or placed in syrup before freezing. Some fruits such as bananas and apples require covering with ascorbic acid prior to freezing to prevent the natural darkening color when exposed.

Vegetables are simple to freeze. Slice them to pieces or remove unnecessary parts such as stalks or leaves. Some types of vegetables such as pepper can be directly frozen but others such as broccoli, celery, and beets have to be cooked or blanched and placed in cold water before they are placed in the freezer. This can preserve your bard for up to 6 months.

© 2009, About This or That. All rights reserved.