Pressure Canning Beans

Canned pinto beans

In January, I was busy with my pressure canner, bottling beans. I bottled pinto beans and black beans. I still have the canner on my stove top, and plan to bottle some carrots today or tomorrow. It is nice to have beans on hand. It is so economical to bottle your own. I store beans in #10 cans in my food storage pantry, which I get from my local LDS (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) cannery. You can get information on how to order here. I get 25# of beans, and then put them into #10 cans. Pinto beans cost me about $0.74/pound. When you include the cost of the can, lid and oxy pack, the cost is closer to $1/pound. However, I can store the beans for at least 5-6 years, and they cook up great.

For Christmas, "Santa" bought me a Cuisinart Electric Pressure Cooker. This is such a great tool for cooking beans. I have a stove top pressure cooker, a Fagor to be exact. That being said, I love being able to set the electric pressure cooker and walk away to do other things. I can saute some diced onion in the Cuisinart first, add the beans and water, then set it to cook. The beans come out perfect!

I always soak my beans overnight, or for 8 hours before cooking them. Beans are pretty dirty, so rinsing and soaking are a must. After cooking them, I bottle them up with the hot fluid in the pot, and pressure can them. I have an All American 921 and love it. Check the Ball Blue Book for times and PSI.

Another method for bottling beans is to rinse and soak the beans overnight. Put them into the canning bottles, and pour boiling water over the beans to the 1" mark. Wipe the rims, put the lid on and hand tighten the ring.



Cooking a Whole Turkey in a Pressure Cooker

I've had my pressure canner now for a few months, and have only used it a few times. I have a small pressure cooker, but it isn't large enough to cook a turkey in. Since I've been wanting to try pressure cooking a whole turkey, I defrosted one I had in the deep freeze and got it ready for cooking. I must say, that this is the easiest way to prepare a turkey, with the best results as well. After taking all of the organs and pieces out of the cavity, and rinsing the entire bird, I put it in the pressure canner, filled the cavity with carrots and onion and put about 2 cups of chicken broth in. Put the lid on, got it cooking, put the pressure value on and got it up to 15 pounds of pressure. It cooked for 40 minutes. I couldn't believe how the meat just fell off of the bone! Pug and Luigi were very excited when I got to the point of taking the lid off. The aroma was amazing. I put on a plastic glove, and just picked the turkey off, discarded the bones, and fed pieces of turkey to the dogs here and there. I took my first bite and couldn't believe how tasty it was! Below, see what one 15 pound turkey yielded. I got 8 cups of broth, and plenty of turkey to last us for sandwiches and to serve with the carrots from the pot, left over green beans and mashed potatoes. I am going to stock up on turkeys on sale this fall. This one cost me $5 last December. I might pressure cook the meat, then put the meat into jars and pressure can them. Same with the broth. Try this method of cooking a turkey. I think you'll find this easy to prepare and the clean up was very quick and easy.