Water Bath Canning With No Equipment

Canned beets, grapefruit marmalade, and pickled cauliflower.

Food preservation is definitely my “thing”, because it helps me buy foods cheaply when they’re in season and then make them last a while in my stockpile so I can benefit from them when the prices are higher.
 Once upon a time I thought most food preservation methods were not possible for me to do; only freezing foods seemed doable. I didn’t own a dehydrator, nor did I have the money to lay out to purchase one. Pickling seemed too iffy and difficult. Canning? Absolutely no extra money to spend on equipment, not to ention the recurrent expense of jars.
Eventually I got past my fear of pickling, built my own dehydrator with which to dehydrate my vegetables, but put off any hopes of canning. I didn’t have the money to lay out for it. Canning was an expensive endeavor unlikely to ever happen around  here.
Then along comes blog reader Beanna83 and proved me wrong. On her say so, I discovered that I can can for free! No money needs to be laid out for canning equipment. You can preserve foods in glass jars without any bought canning equipment.

Water Bath Canning For Free

Equipment Needed
2 large pots. One pot that is both wide and deep. If your pot isn’t very deep, you’ll only be able to can smaller jars. The height of the pot needs to be at least 3-4 inches taller than the height of your canning jars.
A second large pot that will fit your glass jars inside, even sideways or a dishwasher or even a large container that can hold your jars and can withstand heat.
Recycled commercial jars with pop top covers. Even though this isn’t “recommended”, as long as you make sure there is a seal (see below), you’ll be fine. If you don’t buy anything in jars, you can ask others who do to save their jars for you. (I’ve began offering an incentive that if you give me at least 4 jars, I’ll give you back one filled with homemade jam.)
Hot mitts.
A ladle.
A funnel, preferably with a wide mouth.
A spoon.
A few towels.

Instructions:
1. Prepare food with a recipe that is suitable for canning in a water bath. Use google to find recipes for canning. These will usually be acidic. Most fruits are acidic enough, as are tomatoes. Other foods need to be canned with vinegar if you’re using the water bath method (this method). This is one such example of a site with plenty of canning recipes and instructions.
2. Wash your jars and covers very well, inspecting the covers and the jars to make sure that none have any chinks or cracks or disfiguration.
3. Heat the jars. If you have a dishwasher, put your jars through a cycle and keep them warm in the dishwasher. If you don’t have a dishwasher, put the jars in a pot of water and bring to a boil. You want your jars to remain hot, because if you let them cool down and then add hot food/liquid or add to a hot water bath, the jar will crack. Glass needs gradual temperature changes. Alternatively, you can put jars in a basin with warm water for a few minutes, pour off the water and add warmer water, etc… until you have a basin filled with hot water and jars.
4. Boil the jar covers in water.
5. In the meantime, lay a towel across the bottom of your giant pot, fill it with water part way, and bring to a boil.
6. Take your jars out of the hot water or dishwasher and put them on a towel. Use a ladle to remove some of the hot water and use hot mitts if necessary.
7. Fill the jars with the food with the help of a wide mouth funnel and a spoon in the method recommended in the canning recipe you’re using.
8. Remove the covers from the boiling water, and with the assistance of hot mitts, place on the jar and tighten as well as you can.
9. Carefully, gently place the filled and closed jars in the giant pot of boiling water, taking care that they are standing upright on the towel and not touching each other or the sides of the pot.
10. Cover the jars with boiling water by at least 2 inches. You don’t want to pour any water directly on the jars- pour the water in between the jars when adding.
11. Bring the pot of water to a rolling boil and boil for the length of time specified in the recipe.
12. Turn off the fire and ladle water out into another container. You want to ladle enough water out so you’re able to grab the upper part of the jar without getting your hot mitt wet.
13. Grab the upper part of the jar with your hot mitt, remove from the pot, and place on a towel. Do the same for all the jars.
14. Leave the jars undisturbed for a few hours or overnight.
15. Check for a seal. If you’re using commercial jars, most covers come with a pop top that says “Button pops up when original seal is broken” or something like that. You do not want that button popped up. If it is down, that means that your cans are sealed properly. If the cover never popped down, the seal didn’t hold and you should put that jar in the refrigerator to be eaten.
16. Put the jars away in a cool, dark place.

P.S. For those who say that this isn’t safe because you can’t properly reseal commercial jars, you should have been here when I tried getting 3 grown men to open a jar of pickled cauliflower that had sealed too tightly. In the end, no one was able to get it open and I needed to poke a hole in the cover to release the vacuum.

Have you ever canned? Do you use purchased equipment or do it equipmentless like I do?
If you haven’t canned yet, do you think you will ever try?


Linking up with Frugal Friday, Friday Foods, Fight Back Friday, Pennywise Platter Thursday, Vegetarian Foodie Friday, and Foodie Friday

0 Responses

  1. I agree totally. Week before last I made a big batch of homemade bone broth chicken soup. I washed my jars, lids and rings in the dishwasher and poured the hot soup into the jars, lided and closed tightly, placed in fridge and forgot about them.

    Last night I was cleaning out the fridge and found them. I thought "oh no! They're gone bad now!" because I didn't actually can them in a water bath. Upon checking them this morning, I found that they are ALL sealed. Yay!

    How long will they keep?

  2. I never purchase enough jarred foods from the grocery store to even think about reusing them. I've always stocked my kitchen with canning jars instead of plastic tuperware crap that goes bad relatively quickly. I've never had a problem picking up pint or quart jars for 50 cents at thrift stores around town. I bought over 2 dozen jars from some one at the flea market for $5. Lids and ring replacements are real cheap by the dozen. Canning with canning products doesn't seem all that more expensive than reusing jars from store bought stuff. But then again, trying to stock pile on glass jars when I only buy jarred sauce a couple times a year seems rather tedious to me. I also get my fresh produce in exchange for canning or preparing special foods with the stuff they give me. I don't have to buy tomatoes, peppers, onions, lettuce, pumpkin, beets, celery, strawberries, green beans, fresh herbs, and so much more. I did splurge on a canning funnel at walmart and I'm thinking it's time to splurge on some tongs to remove the jars (too many close calls with hot water). Its easy to be cheap, frugal, and stay within newer guidelines.

  3. I'm confused about one thing: why the towel in the giant pot of boiling water that you process the filled jars in? I didn't see any mention of it in later steps, and clean kitchen towels are a scarce commodity for me.

  4. Beets (as shown in your photo)and many other low acid foods must be processed in a pressure canner. Yep I know what your going to say "I have been canning Beets this way for years, no problem. "Well like many things you can often get away with a few times, but one day your luck will run out and unfortunately for you and your u lucky dinner guest, botulism can not be smelled, tasted, or seen, but is still deadly. Please if any of you are thinking this is a great idea it is not! Please do it the right way, it is not that expensive especially after you have your proper jars and equipment. Not only that, it is way easier with the right tools. Good luck, I hope your luck continues, but do me a favor, never invite me to dinner, I don't like to be rude, but I would be…. Russian Roulette is a game you can survive, but will you play it? Can like this and that is EXACTLY what your doing.

  6. I feel it was a great introduction to canning. I read the comments about the lids and I swore I read in this article about boiling the jars AND lids… but I was wrong. But common sense dictates… clean and boil your lids… is that to hard to read between the lines? Haha

  8. We have been reusing jars for canning for a long time and storing them for up to 2 years. Here in the UK canning jars and equipment are very exspencive

  10. Low acid broth that was not properly canned is a frightening thing. Its a little late to influence your decision, but for any future readers: beware! The refrigerator temperatures probably kept it relatively safe for a short time frame like a week but I would be highly cautious of such an item and at if it was completely necessary to use the food then at least bring it to a rolling boil before eating.
    The ONLY safe way to safely can low acid foods is with a pressure canner!

    With all that said, I've eaten leftovers from the fridge older than a week that were not preserved in any way and survived.

  15. Id love to start canning but had a question about water. We live in an area with nasty hard water. When we boil water we get a white film on top of calcium buildup. Will this affect the canning/processing of the jars?

  16. Id love to start canning but had a question about water. We live in an area with nasty hard water. When we boil water we get a white film on top of calcium buildup. Will this affect the canning/processing of the jars?

  17. Wow… I live in small apt, can't spend $ on equipment, but the old way of canning is true. J remember my mom canning with fancy equipment, turning jars over too. These day, every penny needs to be saved. Sick of preservatives and junk. Thank you for all this…

  18. Wow… I live in small apt, can't spend $ on equipment, but the old way of canning is true. J remember my mom canning with fancy equipment, turning jars over too. These day, every penny needs to be saved. Sick of preservatives and junk. Thank you for all this…

  19. What do I do if I already made my jam and is in fridge now but didnt give the water bath first? Can i still do it after it's been in fridge?

  20. Because the bottom of the pot is directly on the heating element, it's far hotter than the surrounding water and the abrupt temperature change can shatter your jars, the towel insulates the bottom of the jars from the bottom of the pot. If you don't use it, you might get lucky and not shatter them, but it's honestly not worth the risk and the mess if you get unlucky.

  21. Because the bottom of the pot is directly on the heating element, it's far hotter than the surrounding water and the abrupt temperature change can shatter your jars, the towel insulates the bottom of the jars from the bottom of the pot. If you don't use it, you might get lucky and not shatter them, but it's honestly not worth the risk and the mess if you get unlucky.

Water Bath Canning With No Equipment

Canned beets, grapefruit marmalade, and pickled cauliflower.

Food preservation is definitely my “thing”, because it helps me buy foods cheaply when they’re in season and then make them last a while in my stockpile so I can benefit from them when the prices are higher.
 Once upon a time I thought most food preservation methods were not possible for me to do; only freezing foods seemed doable. I didn’t own a dehydrator, nor did I have the money to lay out to purchase one. Pickling seemed too iffy and difficult. Canning? Absolutely no extra money to spend on equipment, not to ention the recurrent expense of jars.
Eventually I got past my fear of pickling, built my own dehydrator with which to dehydrate my vegetables, but put off any hopes of canning. I didn’t have the money to lay out for it. Canning was an expensive endeavor unlikely to ever happen around  here.
Then along comes blog reader Beanna83 and proved me wrong. On her say so, I discovered that I can can for free! No money needs to be laid out for canning equipment. You can preserve foods in glass jars without any bought canning equipment.

Water Bath Canning For Free

Equipment Needed
2 large pots. One pot that is both wide and deep. If your pot isn’t very deep, you’ll only be able to can smaller jars. The height of the pot needs to be at least 3-4 inches taller than the height of your canning jars.
A second large pot that will fit your glass jars inside, even sideways or a dishwasher or even a large container that can hold your jars and can withstand heat.
Recycled commercial jars with pop top covers. Even though this isn’t “recommended”, as long as you make sure there is a seal (see below), you’ll be fine. If you don’t buy anything in jars, you can ask others who do to save their jars for you. (I’ve began offering an incentive that if you give me at least 4 jars, I’ll give you back one filled with homemade jam.)
Hot mitts.
A ladle.
A funnel, preferably with a wide mouth.
A spoon.
A few towels.

Instructions:
1. Prepare food with a recipe that is suitable for canning in a water bath. Use google to find recipes for canning. These will usually be acidic. Most fruits are acidic enough, as are tomatoes. Other foods need to be canned with vinegar if you’re using the water bath method (this method). This is one such example of a site with plenty of canning recipes and instructions.
2. Wash your jars and covers very well, inspecting the covers and the jars to make sure that none have any chinks or cracks or disfiguration.
3. Heat the jars. If you have a dishwasher, put your jars through a cycle and keep them warm in the dishwasher. If you don’t have a dishwasher, put the jars in a pot of water and bring to a boil. You want your jars to remain hot, because if you let them cool down and then add hot food/liquid or add to a hot water bath, the jar will crack. Glass needs gradual temperature changes. Alternatively, you can put jars in a basin with warm water for a few minutes, pour off the water and add warmer water, etc… until you have a basin filled with hot water and jars.
4. Boil the jar covers in water.
5. In the meantime, lay a towel across the bottom of your giant pot, fill it with water part way, and bring to a boil.
6. Take your jars out of the hot water or dishwasher and put them on a towel. Use a ladle to remove some of the hot water and use hot mitts if necessary.
7. Fill the jars with the food with the help of a wide mouth funnel and a spoon in the method recommended in the canning recipe you’re using.
8. Remove the covers from the boiling water, and with the assistance of hot mitts, place on the jar and tighten as well as you can.
9. Carefully, gently place the filled and closed jars in the giant pot of boiling water, taking care that they are standing upright on the towel and not touching each other or the sides of the pot.
10. Cover the jars with boiling water by at least 2 inches. You don’t want to pour any water directly on the jars- pour the water in between the jars when adding.
11. Bring the pot of water to a rolling boil and boil for the length of time specified in the recipe.
12. Turn off the fire and ladle water out into another container. You want to ladle enough water out so you’re able to grab the upper part of the jar without getting your hot mitt wet.
13. Grab the upper part of the jar with your hot mitt, remove from the pot, and place on a towel. Do the same for all the jars.
14. Leave the jars undisturbed for a few hours or overnight.
15. Check for a seal. If you’re using commercial jars, most covers come with a pop top that says “Button pops up when original seal is broken” or something like that. You do not want that button popped up. If it is down, that means that your cans are sealed properly. If the cover never popped down, the seal didn’t hold and you should put that jar in the refrigerator to be eaten.
16. Put the jars away in a cool, dark place.

P.S. For those who say that this isn’t safe because you can’t properly reseal commercial jars, you should have been here when I tried getting 3 grown men to open a jar of pickled cauliflower that had sealed too tightly. In the end, no one was able to get it open and I needed to poke a hole in the cover to release the vacuum.

Have you ever canned? Do you use purchased equipment or do it equipmentless like I do?
If you haven’t canned yet, do you think you will ever try?


Linking up with Frugal Friday, Friday Foods, Fight Back Friday, Pennywise Platter Thursday, Vegetarian Foodie Friday, and Foodie Friday

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