Canned Carrots

I've been reading Hickery Holler Farm's blog and she cans *everything*.  She said to watch the sales and fill up those emptying jars with cheap winter produce.   Carrots are super cheap this time of year.   We've been getting 5 lb bags of carrots for a couple of dollars at Sam's.

I thought it would be a good idea to can some up to see if we'd use them that way through the year.    You know, to dump in soups, or for glazed carrots [instead of sweet potatoes], and in carrot cake.

Since carrots are a low acid food, I used the pressure canner to can them.    As you know, I'm just getting to know my canner.  Slowly.   Only a couple of things each year, mostly tomasqua and pumpkin.  Last year I used it for green beans, too.  I am happy to say that I'm slowly getting the hang of it. 

My goal this year is to do a few jars of new things so I can get really comfortable with the pressure canner. 

Basically the process is this:

• Fill up the jars and put them in the canner.
• Add a couple of inches of water to the bottom of the canner.
• Close the lid tightly and heat to boil [9 on my stove]
•  Let vent for 10 minutes then put jiggler on. [10 lbs for carrots]
• When the jiggler makes noise start the timer [25 minutes for pints of carrots] and you can drop the temp down to medium/high [6.5-7].  It should jiggle once a minute or more.
• When the processing is done, turn the temp off and leave everything alone until completely cool.   Don't touch the jiggler. 
• When completely cool, open the canner, wash the jars and you're done. 

It sounds complicated but it's not bad.   I keep a little list of instructions close by and the more often I do it, the more natural it seems.  It's worth it to be able to can squash and carrots and beans.

Note:   Pressure canning is not something I can do in very large quantities.   I get the best results [no siphoning] when I do enough for only one canner load a day.   Things siphon when I try to move things along too fast or take the jiggler off right away, etc.    If I just do one load and leave it to cool overnight, then I have very little siphoning, and that makes for happy food and a happy canner.