Does botulism scare you away from canning your own food?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I pickle things occasionally like cucumbers and mixed veggies. I can jams in the summer. But I’m not canning anything that has a botulism risk because 1) I don’t have pressure cooker and they scare me anyway 2) low acid canned foods aren’t appealing to me. I don’t want to eat canned green beans, asparagus and such whether it is home or store canned.

Farmer here: agree about a lot of canned goods. Not a fan. Freezing is superior for many things, like corn, etc. some veggies don’t freeze (asparagus!) and are just better to eat fresh.

Canned fruit products can be great, though. Compote-like fruit is good. Just plain canned fruit can be lacking. Applesauce, apple pie filling, apple butter, etc doesn’t change and are good candidates for canning. You can make these on demand, of course, but the purpose of canning is to preserve a harvest to use year round, and sometimes you have to sacrifice taste. This is not so much an issue for shoppers not on a budget who can afford fresh food—but it is bad for the environment to be shipping produce around the world.

[Anonymous]

Farmer again—canning safety is a matter of science. If you want to water bath something inventive, like a jam with some different ingredients, and are worried about its safety, you can actually just do a pH test on it (do a few on some different spoonfuls). When in doubt, add some citric acid/lemon juice so you are clearly in a safe range.

Many veggies and all meats must be pressure canned, but if you follow parameters (including seal checks) you aren’t going to get sick.

[Anonymous]

Sorry - I won't eat anything homemade canned. I would politely accept and then trash it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry - I won't eat anything homemade canned. I would politely accept and then trash it.

No one asked this.

[Anonymous]

Yes. I dry and freeze food instead