Canning bolognese in an oven

[henene4]

I tend to make bolognese in bulk, and so I did for my partner.
It's really nice to just heat it up, boil some pasta and have a really nice quick meal.

I usually freeze it, but my partners freezer really was to full to do that, but we already bought the stuff to make the bolognese.

So I read through some posts and we landed on the solution to can it in the oven.

The biggest issue with canning such stuff in an oven is you can't see when the stuff actually starts to boil.
But a trick I found was to just add a dummy glass with just water. You can clearly see bubbles rising in there and when they do, the other stuff will be at temp as well.

Filled a deep dish with the glasses (not touching) and about an inch of warm water, put that in the cold oven.
Started off at 175C (350F) (we used the "Eco Convection" setting, but basically any setting should do) until we saw sufficient boiling, then lowered to 125C (255F).
We used twist off glasses and left it for 2h. The switched it off for 30min, then took the glasses out.

Worked flawlessly. Haven't had any yet, but given some people boil bolognese for 4h or more, it shouldn't be much of an issue.

Just thought I'd share that.
For stuff like bolognese or any ragout type stuff that should work. And you save the defrosting step when heating up.

 

[combo52]

Canning food in your oven

Is not considered safe. It should only be done in a pressure cooker. You can die from eating foods contaminated with a botulism it’s not worth the risk.

It’s much faster and easier to do a pressure cooker anyway.

John

 

[petek]

Yikes

No way would I eat it. Bolognese and all tomato based sauces with meat, veggies etc requires pressure canning. Not even water bath canning is sufficient for low acid foods which bolognese is. There is so much room for error no recognized health authority recommends oven canning.

 

[henene4]

With 2h at boiling, I don't see much room for error, especially if it's something you'll be reheating before eating.
The biggest threat in canning is botulism, and botulinum toxins are deactivated at 85C / 180F after only one minute.
So, even if anything survived 2h at boiling, reheating - which you do with stuff like this - makes that danger redundant.

Tomatoes are borderline low acidity food. Stuff made from them is generally considered low acidity, correct.
But even there the german consumer protection agency just recommends canning twice at boiling within a few days from each other.

The biggest german canning product company - Weck - only says not to can stuff like bolognese in the oven since you can't tell if temp has been reached. With the addition of the water dummy - and a huge amount of time - that's not the concern anyway.
They recommend a normal canning pot, no pressure, and 2h at 100C / 212F. They don't even recommend the double canning.

Sure wouldn't sell this.
But I think there's a huge difference between hoke cooking and commercial operations.

 

[mrboilwash]

A friend of mine once mentioned he`d always make a larger batch of bolognese and just put some of it boiling hot into super clean twist off glasses the same way as you`d do when making jam. No canning involved.
It`s supposed to keep up to a couple of weeks in the fridge then. Not sure if I`d want to take the risk but it sounds like a good way to increase the shelve life compared to just storing left overs in the refrigerator.

 

[henene4]

Most online sources regarding the canning method mention about 6 months of shelf life, without refrigeration.

Doing the hot fill and flip method works wonders with stuff like jam or jelly of course, but also just plain tomato sauce or simple soups like pumpkin.
Especially with stuff you reheat anyway, the chance of much terrible happening is slim as long as you do the typical sniff and visual inspection.

With something containing meat I was a little worried. Given the oven was running pretty low the majority of time, the buck of electricity was cheap insurance.

 

[petek]

You can't smell botulism, you can't see it, or taste it.

I canned stuff in a boiling waterbath for 30 years or more and never took any chances. Everything was sterilized in boiling water and once out of the water untouched by my hands. Not into it anymore.

However if have excess sauce like that and you need room in the freezer just find a second hand vacuum sealer , or a new one if you want to spend more. Vacuum bag enough for 1 or 2 people, say 800ml and lie it flat to cool. Then pop in the freezer, takes a lot less freezer space than jars because you can stack them flat or upright. Defrosts faster too being flat, or boil it in the bag, or etc etc. whatever works.

 

[brisnat81]

The rule of thumb in Australia, is that it’s never safe to use a water bath for canning meat. Even with tomato’s, you need to add an acid to make it safe.

Do you have links to the information that suggests it’s safe to water bath can meat?

 

[mattl]

Got to agree with everyone,  terrible idea.

 

I've canned for decades, 99% were tomatoes, rest were pickles and such.  I open kettle can tomatoes but I add citric or ascorbic acid now, years ago tomatoes were more acidic and it was not needed. Pure tomatoes are the ONLY thing I'd open kettle preserve.

 

Once you add meat and other items all safety is gone. I'd toss that stuff quickly and never eat it.

 

[combo52]

I have always used a pressure canner for canning at home

Even tomatoes, which may be high acid it just takes less time to use a pressure canner that way you don’t have to add anything to them. When you pressure can you only need an inch or so of water in the canner you don’t have to heat up 5 gallons of water and boil it for a half an hour pressure canning tomatoes only takes about 10 minutes.

Yes, I would definitely not eat anything that has meat in it that had not been pressure canned Hopefully it won’t kill you, but I guess you disappear Henrik we will know what happened to you.

John

 

[tomturbomatic]

I would can it at 10 pounds of pressure to be safe or freeze it in your freezer if you have more freezer space than your friend.

 

[foraloysius]

Henrik,

Have you seen this?

Fleisch einkochen: Lies das, bevor du loslegst!

Du möchtest Fleisch einkochen? Gut, dass du hier bist! Beim Einkochen von Fleisch gibt es nämlich einiges zu beachten – Stichwort Botulismus!

www.wurzelwerk.net

 

[mattl]

John, I agree pressure is the way to go but the cost is substantial.

 

When I can tomatoes I generally do 18-20 quarts. I have 2 open kettles that hold 7 quarts  each, I process quarts for 45 minutes after boiling starts,  so a little over an hour to process 14 qts.  Can't justify spending $125+ to save a bit of time, if I canned things other than tomatoes I'd consider it. Tomatoes are easy and cost effective, other stuff takes more time and vegetable wise I prefer frozen.

 

[ea56]

My paternal grandparents had a city lot next door to their home in Richmond, Calif. that my grandpa had planted entirely with vegetables and fruit.  My grandma canned all of it except the strawberries.  She had a dry cleaning shop that she worked in all day taking in the  cleaning and doing alterations.

 

During the Summer months when all the vegetables were becoming ripe she would come home every night from the dry cleaning shop, eat the dinner that my school teacher aunt had prepared and then she would set into canning all of the vegetables in earnest.  She would work at this task until almost 11pm, then go to bed.

 

Grandma had two huge Presto Canners and she would have both of them going at the same time on her O Keeffe and Merritt gas stove.  She canned green beans, beets, corn, tomatoes, peaches, pears, peas, carrots, rhubarb, mince meat, pickles, relish, you name it grandma Ruth canned it.  Except the cabbage which she turned in to Sauerkraut in huge crocks.  All of the fruits of her labor were stored in the basement on shelves that lined the walls.  

 

Grandma’s canned green beans and her canned peaches were out of this world!  Every family dinner at their house there would always be great big bowls of her green beans.  

 

Now mind you, when my grandpa married grandma she didn’t even know how to cook at the age of 20.  She came from a very poor family.  Her father had deserted the family when she was about 5 and her mother raised her three children by herself, living over a laundry in Springfield, Missouri and working in the laundry during the day.  

 

Since they could afford only the most basic of food items grandma never learned to  cook.  Once they were married grandpa bought her a brand new set of Wear Ever Aluminum pans, the triangular  kind that you could fit three pans on one wood stove burner.  Then he hired a neighbor lady to teach his Ruthie how to cook.  She was a quick learner.

 

Eddie

 

[delco1946]

When my dad was a boy in 50s Maine, people died from polio, botulism in inappropriately canned products, and went blind from attempting to make their own bathtub booze (Unknowingly making wood alcohol instead). None of these are things to trifle with.

Length of time boiling is irrelevant, whether it is 2 hours or 4, you won’t hit the temps needed to kill the bacteria during canning. Temps needed to kill the bacteria during canning and temps needed to kill the bacteria during boiling or (re)heating are two different topics.

Seems risky to leave your only safety net as long enough boiling of the food product upon opening/ consuming. This is especially true if you give some away, I personally don’t like scorching hot foods and so unless told otherwise, I would not cook it sufficiently long enough to kill the botulism. And frankly, if someone told me their home- canned good was at risk of botulism, I would just toss it as it’s not worth the risk to me personally. Please be careful!

 

[askolover]

Even when I used to can tomatoes we added a little lemon juice to them to increase the acidity and I always pressure canned (just sold my all American pressure canner).

 

[mattl]

Eddie, brings back memories, growing up we had a fruit cellar in the basement. It was a moderate sized room under the front porch that kept a cooler temp than the rest of the basement.  One wall was lined with shelves top to bottom with all the canned goods. Fruit, jam, pickles, peppers and of course tomatoes. Early June  my mother would make strawberry rhubarb jam, sealed with paraffin. Labor day my folks would can tomatoes.  My dad would can end of the garden in the fall with green tomatoes, various peppers, cauliflower, green beans and what ever was around. Also there was a crock of pickles down there too.

 

This was just stuff we all liked and they grew up with.  A few of my cousins still can a bit, one did buy a pressure canner to process stuff with meat in it.

 

[jamiel]

During COVID I did a rabbit-trail around home canning customs worldwide (I think I'd come upon an old Ball Blue Book from the 40s or so). There is amazing divergence in what gets canned, when and how. If you're getting serious about canning in the US, you need to invest in a recent (last couple years) Ball Blue Book and/or engage with your local county extension for local science-based guidance.

WECK is the German equivalent to Ball (leader in the marketplace) and would be the "bible" for German canning. Trust them.

Each country has it's own preferred jars/lids/seals/timings/etc. Really kind of interesting. Even Canada differs from the US.

That said, in the US they advise pressure canning of unacidulated tomatoes; water bath is approved for acidulated. At a local farmers' market the local University Extension (Michigan State University---first land grant institution in the US) a home economist educator was canning tomatoes water bath on a 110 electric hotplate outdoors. I commented "brave, don't you think" and she said "yeah, but it's a demonstration". I seriously thought you couldn't do a water bath without 220 current to get a good rolling boil. Had a nice conversation with her---she did her dissertation on acidulation levels (she was using Realemon) so was quite an expert.

 

[dustin92]

So much misinformation here... Literally anything can be canned in a water bath, which provided the temp and time are correct, your sauce is perfectly fine. US and European canning times are different (for whatever reason). US time for anything containing meat would be 3 hours at a rolling boil, lids totally covered. European time would be 2 hours rolling boil, water only to the shoulder of the jars. I have no experience with oven canning but I would assume if the contents of the jars were boiling for 2 hours you are probably fine. I water bath meats and homemade soups (3 hours) and we can our pickles and tomatoes open kettle style (no water bath or pressure canning). Not only have we never killed anyone, we haven't even lost a jar in recent years. Please don't throw away your hard work.