Canning Stew Meat

Today we adventured out and canned stew meat.  Before this year, my husband and I have never canned using a pressure cooker.  I was surprised how easy it actually is.  I’d always heard horror stories of how the pressure canner can blow up, etc.  So far, we’ve followed instructions carefully and haven’t had any problems at all.  My husband called Ivies, our local grocery store, this morning to see if they could get us 20 pounds of stew meat.  They said that they could so my husband headed to town to get the meat while I stayed at home and got the bottles washed and sterilized.  I found a way on the internet to sterilize bottles using the oven.  Just pre-heat your oven to a temperature of 225 degrees and place cookie sheets with your jars and bands on them in the oven and set a timer for 10 minutes.  Do not open your oven door before the 10 minutes are  up.  If you leave them in for more than 10 minutes, that’s OK.   I’ve used this method for the past few years and we haven’t been poisoned, yet – ha!  

OK, let’s get this process moving.  Our first step was browning the meat, not cooking it.  We browned our meat using Lost River Valley Seasoning Spice, just till the outside edges were browned and the meat was still red on the inside.  The pan on the right is all but ready to remove from the burner while the two pans on the left are just getting started.

After we browned the meat, we put it in pint jars, leaving a 1” headspace, then poured our broth that we got from browning the meat (plus 5 cans of purchased beef broth) in the jars of meat to within 1” of the top.

Now all we had left to do was use a wet paper towel, wipe of the top rim of the jars, place on the lids and rings and walla…………ready to be processed.  After that, we start the next batch.

We have a 21 quart All American pressure canner and were able to place 8 pint jars on the bottom row, place a metal rack over those 8 pints and top them off with another 8 pints.  After those were processed, we had 10 more pints to do.  Processing your food is what takes so much time.  You have to build the pressure up in your pressure canner up till steam is coming out pretty good then you need to let it steam for at least 10 minutes before you start processing.  For our altitude, we are required to pressure cook our meat at 15 lbs. for 75 minutes.

There are more steps to pressure canning than I have mentioned on this blog so please do not use this blog as a guide if you are going to pressure can any meat.  The safe and sure way is to always read the instruction book that came with your pressure cooker or you can find instructions from your local extension offices on the internet.  And now, let’s take a look at our finished product.  Can’t wait to use this meat in casseroles, soups, stews, etc. – Yum, yum!