Just because one "can" do something doesn't mean they "should" do it. ;)

Yeah there are lots of "I have always done it this way and I'm still alive" canners out there. And they refuse to change with the times and choose to ignore modern research, techniques, and guidelines. It is their risk to take. You just have to decide if you want to take the same risk along with them or go the safe route.

Link below is to the current approved recipe for meatless tomato sauce. You'll not pressure canning is required because of all the low-acid vegetables included in the recipe.

Dave

Here is a link that might be useful: NCHFP- Spaghetti Sauce

To answer your specific question about "sterilizing" the sauce, the answer is a resounding NO.

While everything in your sauce is cooked to begin with, it is not "sterilized". There are some (many? several? a few?) microbial organisms which are not killed at 212 degrees F, even many hours at 212 degrees F.

Normally this is not a problem, as the causes of common food-borne illneses are killed at 212 degrees F or below. Also, this cooked food is consumed immediately or refridgerated. In any case, the food is held in AEROBIC conditions (meaning oxygen is present).

Where canning complicates matters is that canned food is stored in ANAEROBIC (low or no oxygen) conditions and at room temperature. One of the biggest microbials that can survive time at 212 degrees F is the botulism spore. The botulism spore also requires anaerobic conditions, a low acid (pH neutral or alkaline) conditions, and temperatures higher that refridgerator temperatures to grow into botulism bacillus.

Tomato sauce with other veges is low acid, and once canned it is anaerobic and stored at room temperature, the perfect conditions to grow botulism.

So, spaghetti sauce must be pressure canned to heat it above 212 (to approximatley 240 degrees F) to inactivate any botulism spores that might be in the sauce. Addition of acid to tomato products also helps to shift the pH balance enough so that botulism spores cannot develop into botulism bacteria.

So the short answer is that 212 degrees F is not hot enough to "sterilize" anything, be it sauce or jars or medical equipment, etc. Sauce must be heated hotter than 212 (to about 240 or 10lbs pressure at sea level) to kill all the potentially dangerous organisms that might be present.

And to answer the next question you will think of, high acids foods (fruits, jams, pickles, etc) can be processed in a boiling water bath at 212 degrees F because the high acid nature of the food would prevent any botulism spore present from germinating even though the precessing temperature is not hot enough to inactivate those spores.

Sharon

Lisa,
You CANNOT safely can your own recipes like that and insure you will not get food poisoning or have lid failure . (Yes, I get people asking me often why the lids blew off their jars !) You find a recipe from a reliable source, such as the Ball Blue book or the link that was already sent for you and use it to insure safety . The only changes you can make are substituting one kind of pepper or onion in a recipe, reduce the LOW acid things, and use different dried herbs and spices or omit the dried herbs and spices. You could also use a different type of vinegar in a recipe as long as they are both 5 % acidity, such as white vinegar or cider vinegar.
There is now way to safely can your own recipes and know the ph level nor the density. The thickness, or density, is just as important as the ph level.
Your friend has be lucky so far... that is all I can say.
You can process the jars in a boiling water bath canner the rest of your life and still not know if all botulism spores were killed. It takes a pressure canner in those low acid environments to destroy botulism. The boiling water can never be above 212 degrees at sea level.

There are few recipes with a little bit of low acid things that can be safely done in the boiling water bath canner. Most of those recipes are in the Ball Blue book.

One of the things I teach is that there are cooking recipes and safe canning recipes. The two are NOT the same.
Your friend should be freezing that sauce.

There is a free online class available at the link below. It would be great for both you and your friend to take.

Here is a link that might be useful: Free online classes.

You have already received excellent advice.

It is very possible that your friend's spaghetti sauce has sometimes had toxins in it, but she didn't know it. Fortunately, boiling sauce 10-20 minutes in an open kettle after opening (which many people do with their spaghetti sauce) will kill many of these toxins. So botulism spores, for instance, may still reside in the sauce, but because of the boiling, active toxins are no longer a problem.

As you can see, there are other risks. If a child, for instance, ran a finger around the rim and licked the sauce or if sauce spattered on the counters when opened and botulism spores were ingested or spread.

Thirty years of canning experience doing the wrong thing isn't praiseworthy. Your friend has been lucky. It's all a matter of the odds.

There are some safe pasta sauce recipes which do permit only water bath processing, but they will call for additional acid such as red wine.

Carol

Ok - I'm convinced!! I'm going to stick with freezing my prepared spaghetti sauce and just can plain tomatoes with the lemon juice to keep it safe. Depending on my harvest this year, it might be worth investing in a pressure canner, but right now I'm not sure I'll do enough to warrant the expense.

Thanks for the info - there's always things other people bring up that you wouldn't think of yourself!!

Lisa

Lisa, Good luck with your canning! (And by the way, there's no such thing as a "failed jam" --- it's just a "successful fruit sauce"! ;-) )

You've had some good explanations as to what the current recommendations are and why, and I agree it's a good idea to follow them. But I have a couple of other comments for you.

The first is that, just in case you're staying up nights worrying about your neighbour, serious poisoning from home canning, especially from something like tomato sauce, is *very rare*. That's of course NOT the same thing as saying it doesn't exist --- there are a few cases every year, and I for one sure don't want to be one of them. (If one DOES get botulism poisoning, for example, it can be fatal.) BUT the actual number of people who become ill, given the thousands and thousands who can, many of them without following the recommendations, is really tiny. A lot of other things I do every day, like drive on a freeway or eat commercial hamburger, are statistically a lot riskier.

I'd still suggest following the recommendations. I think of them as like wearing a seat belt in a car. I've never been in an accident while in a car, and I don't know anyone who has been seriously injured in one. But I know it can happen and it's an easy thing to do to reduce my risk so I do it.

The second thing I wanted to mention is that you don't have to can JUST plain tomatoes with added acid in order to have a product that has been tested and shown to be safe for boiling water bath. The Ball Blue Book has a couple of recipes for tomato sauces that are more seasoned, and there are some others in reputable books. In particular, you might like to try the "Chunky Herbed Pasta Sauce" in Ellie Topp's book _Small Batch Preserving_.

If you don't want to get this book (though you might), this and several other good recipes you can find in a thread on this forum called "Your Greatest Hit Recipes for Leesa" --- or the handy "Condensed version" of that thread that kind forum poster created.

It's not that adding ANY other vegetables or flavourings will automatically make the sauce not acidic enough for water bath canning, but that if you just throw in your own amounts you won't KNOW whether it is or not. And recipes with a large amount of peppers, onions, etc., generally need to be pressure canned.

But all the BBB recipes, and Ellie Topp's, and any from the NCFHP website, have been tested and you don't have to be chicken to make them and BWB and serve them to your family with confidence that they're completely safe. And, certainly, delicious!

Just my added two cents.

Good luck. We'd love to hear how your sauce comes out!

Zabby

Thanks Zabby. My main reasons for starting to can was I wanted to increase the amount of home grown, organic, healthy foods we eat and, of course, saving money is always a good thing as well! So I don't see the sense in taking risks of making anyone sick while I'm trying to keep pesticides and other stuff out of their food! It kinda defeats the purpose so to speak lol!! I did go out and buy a large stand alone freezer so I can buy in bulk and during gardening season, I can freeze things. But it fills up fast! Especially when, unlike last year, we get a good tomato harvest! So I had every intention of canning the tomatoes this year, but I figured if I could make and can sauce from the tomatoes as well, that would free up freezer space for other things. But I do have room to freeze so it's not that critical. I probably did gloss over some things in the Blue Book because I saw that for certain things you need a pressure canner and I don't have one, so I didn't really read those sections.

I do want to learn as much as I can and while I like that book, there's nothing like getting advice from the "experts" who have been doing this for years. Sometimes I find the book a little vague. I want to know WHY you can't do things a certain way. Not just that you can't do it!! I come here and ask, and then I know!

Also, I just LIKE doing this stuff! I'm a real city girl - I don't know anyone else (besides that one person) who would even think of home canning, let alone actually do it!! And it may sound strange, but growing things myself and canning them gives me a sense of security. Like I'm not so helpless and dependant upon technology as I sometimes think. I don't HAVE to settle for what they want to sell me in the stores. I can do it myself and I can control what goes in it!! I just find it very rewarding. There's so much out of our control today, it's comforting and satisfying to me to make a sauce from scratch from tomatoes I grew myself or to make a loaf of bread that I know used organic flour, etc.

Thanks again for all the help. I'll be an old pro before you know it lol!! And some day I might actually get my jam not too runny, and not too hard, but just right lol!!

Lisa

I want to know WHY you can't do things a certain way. Not just that you can't do it!!

Excellent point and one of the best places to learn about the whys is the many publications available on the NCHFP site (index on the left side of the page). Not all of them would be of interest to you of course but there are some directed right at your questions so when you have time be sure to browse through them.

Dave

The other thing is pressure canners are great to have you can make meat sauce, soup for your family ect and it is safe from power outages, freezer breakdown

I agree, Jonas, I can because I can keep it through power outages and it doesn't take precious freezer space that I need for beef, pork, chickens, whatever I'm growing.

I remember losing power for a week once and by day two I was canning beef. I lost quite a lot, but I canned quite a lot too. Fortunately, I had a gas stove that I could light with a match and I have city water. So I could cook, and I could shower, but only in the cold and the dark, LOL.

Annie

This is so funny! I started reading the thread just out of curiosity and then when Lisa mentioned the failed jams/jelies etc. and Zabby's response, I just had to add my 2 cents worth. My pear preserves ala CarolReadingLady's recipe did not set up very well so this morning I warmed some of them and had them with pancakes. Yummy!!!!

jude

Lisa,

Boy, do I hear you! I started canning when I lived in the city and begain growing tomatoes in the backyard. Had a big harvest and wanted to not waste it.

What I didn't realize was how good it would feel to have that sense of self-reliance. I first thought of my home-canned goods a special treats, to take out on special occasions or show off for guests. But I found it easy and fun to can and before long I was canning all the tomato products we ate in a year right from my backyard garden on the streetcar line in Toronto! Most of my friends thought it was weird --- at first I had a hard time even finding the equipment (I remember a young stock boy in the grocery store looking at me with a completely blank look on his face when I asked if they sold jars; he gestured at an aisle of commercial jarred tomato sauce (DUH, lady, there are jars everywhere), and when I said, "No, I mean, EMPTY jars," he clearly thought I was insane. ;-0 ). (In the end I discovered they could order it for me easily at the local chain hardware.)

Anyway, I'm warning you that you never know where it will end! Somehow I'm now living in a tiny town of 4,000, buying most of my produce in the warm months at farm stands, and filling up my pantry every fall with home canning (I got a freezer, too). This winter I started making my own sandwich bread and adding a few meals a week based around beans, which I now cook from dried rather than canned.

Just like you, I find it incredibly satisfying. Some folks on this forum put up almost all their own food, raise their own meat, etc.; I'm not nearly in that category.

But I feel really good looking at shelves full of food I preserved, tasting summer in the frozen goodies, and knowing that if we don't have time or energy to shop or cook one evening, there's plenty of good, homemade stuff to eat in a jar or a freezer bag.

My urban friends still think I'm odd but they love getting homemade goodies as gifts.

Good luck!

Z
P.S. jude, great illustration of the "successful sauce" theory of "failed jam" ! ;-)

I have a large (8 qt?) pressure cooker, but has no pressure gage.

Can I just do the final cooking of my canning stuff in it and then
fill the jars(pre-sterilized)right away and seal them ?
How about adding some lime/lemon juice, citric acid and some table salt?
I am mainly interested in canning tomato sauce. I would rather use freezer technics for vegetables to maintain freshness, color, texture and vitamines better. We all know well that canning has been a pre-refrigeration method of preserving.
But I don't like freezing whole tomatoes.
With sauce, I can reduce the volume to one third, by getting raw juice , skins, seeds and tough pulp out and simmering.

You can cook in the cooker, but not can in it.
So, how are you going to process the sauce ?
You need to follow a safe, tested recipe for sauce. This is a link on canning plain tomato sauce. If you want to add any other vegetables, herbs, etc. you will need to find a safe recipe for that, too. Most of them would need to be pressure canned.
Yes, even with plain tomato sauce you will need to add bottled lemon juice or citric acid crystals. Salt is optional since it is only for flavor.

Here is a link that might be useful: Plain tomato sauce.

Can I just do the final cooking of my canning stuff in it and then
fill the jars(pre-sterilized)right away and seal them ?

Sorry Cyrus but that form of "canning" isn't really canning - there is no processing - and it isn't approved for anything except maybe a few jellys and some pickles.

But you can use any deep pot with a lid - deep enough to cover the jars with 1" or more of water - to BWB process your sauce once it is in the jars. 35 mins. for pints, 40 mins. for quarts. Pressure canning plain tomato sauce isn't required.

And yes, as the link Linda Lou posted tells you, adding the acid is required.

Now if you start adding lots of other vegetables to your tomato sauce then we are talking pressure canning for the required processing.

Dave

Sorry Cyrus but that form of "canning" isn't really canning - there is no processing - and it isn't approved for anything except maybe a few jellys and some pickles.
******

Not even any jams, jellies and pickled items are not considered safe without processing. If they will be stored on the shelf, they need proper processing.

I know Linda Lou but as we also know many in other countries do open kettle jams and jellies and inversion without processing all the time. That is their choice as they aren't bound by our guidelines.

I thought as I typed - now if I say "nothing can be done that way", sure enough someone would say "Now wait a minute, jams and jellies are perfectly safe to just invert. No processing is required!"

Sometimes it's a no-win situation. ;)

Dave

Dave,
Yeh, I know, you won't die from inverting jams and jellies. However, it may save you from having to throw away moldy jams and jellies.
Now the tomato sauce, that would be a different story, you could get food poisoning from not processing that.
But, you know that...