Why Should I Can?

Fresh Preserving provides a number of great benefits which are relevant to today’s lifestyles. While home canning has been around for generations, the reasons why people can today are different than the reasons why people canned products years ago.

Gardening and home canning can lower your grocery bill. Burpee Seed Company (www.burpee.com) estimates that for every $50 spent on seeds and fertilizer, a gardener can yield $1250 worth of produce. As it’s not feasible for a family to enjoy all of that fresh produce all at one time, home canning allows you to preserve that fresh, home grown flavor from your garden for use all year long, and saving on your grocery bill.

Home canning supports sustainable lifestyles. Canning locally-grown produce reduces the carbon footprint created by transporting vegetables around the world in off-seasons. A study by Carnegie Mellon found that 11% of the average American’s household food-related greenhouse gas emissions come from the transportation of foods. You can reduce that by growing your own produce or purchasing it locally, and then fresh preserving the harvest and re-using Ball® Jars year after year.

Fresh preserving allows you to manage your family’s nutrition. Many canning enthusiasts enjoy the versatility and control they have with fresh preserving recipes. When you fresh preserve foods, you can avoid additives and preservatives found in many commercial products, and you may even opt to use organic ingredients.

According to research from The National Gardening Association, 48% of consumers’ garden to ensure their food is safe. Canning is a perfect way to manage the ingredients in your recipes to ensure that your family not only gets the garden fresh flavor of fresh produce, but that they also avoid any undesired ingredients.

Express yourself through unique and creative recipes. For generations canners have used fresh preserving to showcase their own unique style with creative canning recipes. Impress your friends and family by creating unique jams, jellies and other culinary creations.

How To Choose The Right Jar for the Job

Whether you’re making your famous blueberry jam or trying out a new pickle recipe, there’s a jar for the job. Cucumbers fit more easily into wide mouth Ball® glass preserving jars for pickling, while “straight shoulders” (with no curve under the neck of the jar) are safe for freezer storage. Here’s a quick guide to help choose the right jar, whatever you want to fresh preserve or freeze.

Buckingham Hardware also carries many other canning accessories, including replacement lids, bands, canners, jar lifters, jar funnels, and more!

To read more on canning, and to see step by step tutorials, click here.