Pressure canners and induction stove tops?

18 years ago

We have a smooth-top electric range, which is not an induction range. It seems not recommended to use a pressure canner on a smooth-top conventional range (I gather the prolonged heat can damage on some tops). I can do a boiling water bath on it using a stock pot, apparently, but not recommended to use a pressure canner.

I'm looking at buying a separate, counter-top, single burner portable unit for pressure canning. Either a coil or an induction unit.

I know the latter are more expensive. But I like the fact that there's less waste heat going into the kitchen; only the metal container is heated.

I also know that not all steel is magnetic, so not all metal pans work with an induction stove.

Has anyone here used a pressure canner with an induction stove top? If so, what brand was it?

Thanks in advance, --Steve

PS - No, gas is not an option for cooking here, in case anyone wants to suggest that.

Sort by:Oldest

Comments (12)

smokey98042
18 years ago
If you can find a pressure canner that is made from 18/10 stainless steel that will work just fine.

I have no idea where you can get such a canner.
ksrogers
18 years ago
Was just going to say the same thing as aluminium is the primary material for most pressure cookers or canners. Aluminium pans will not work on induction stoves. Another choice for indoors may be a propane buener. The tank can be outdoors and have a long hose going inside. Leave a window open a crack, or have your kitchen exhaust fan going and you should have a very rapid heating using any kind of pan. Clad bottom pans may have problems too, as copper doesn't work well with induction either.
Related Discussions
Difference between pressure cooker and pressure cooker/canner?
Q
Comments (12)
"Pressure canners come deep enough for one layer of quart or smaller size jars, or deep enough for two layers of pint or smaller size jars. The USDA recommends that a canner be large enough to hold at least 4 quart jars to be considered a pressure canner for its published processes. " If you go to the Presto site, nowdays you will see they only list the larger size as canners. They have 18 quart and 23 quart. Anything smaller is under cookers. http://www.gopresto.com/products/products_search.php?search_value=58&operation=Search&search_type=category Here is a link that might be useful: National Center for Home Food Preservation
...See More
Compatibility of range top and pressure canner
Q
Comments (9)
Cpovey...yes, that's my understanding of the problem with glass top and canning...that the top can crack. With my current old coil range, I need HIGH heat for probably 20-30 min. just to get the canner up to pressure. Then you have to process for the necessary time, though at this point I am usually able to back off on the heat. Conate...what sort of processing times are you using? Are you on HIGH heat? Good point about not sliding the canner. That baby is really heavy once I get 7 quarts of tomatoes plus the 2 quarts of water for processing in it. Canning is not for wimps! Fenworth...perhaps your option is the best, the stand-alone burner. Not only could I use it for canning, but also for beer-brewing; boiling the wert has resulted in the occasional boil-over...all over the range top. This then results in the use of many 4 letter words. If I had a stand-alone burner, I could do this outdoors, and I wouldn't have to worry so much about creating chaos in the kitchen. Thanks all.
...See More
First Time Canner - Having Pressure Issues with Old Stove
Q
Comments (12)
I have an old electric stove and it pulses and heats unevenly, even under the best of cooking conditions. That might explain some of your issues with the pressure canner. I got a one burner butane stove that I use on my countertop sometimes for canning. I got it at a restaurant supply store. Works like a charm but you have to buy the fairly pricey little gas canisters to use with it so wouldn't work if you do a LOT of pressure canning. I posted on here once about various stove options and canning and also on the Harvest Forum. I don't have the option of getting gas at my house. I did a lot of reading and thinking on it and just decided to get a new electric coil stove, although a flat top probably would have done OK, many models are appropriate for canning. I decided the benefits of induction just weren't worth the price, for me. I will say this, if you get an electric coil stove, you still are probably going to have to replace the coils and connections from time to time, they corrode and impair the performance of the burners. I have done that on my stove twice so far, due to the heavy duty use I put it to. Don't know if the glass tops last longer or not.
...See More
Pressure Canner for Induction Stove
Q
Comments (5)
As Alexis says, there is a pretty limited selection of pressure canners for induction and none of them are for large scale canning projects. I also have a ten-quart Fagor pressure cooker, like Aleixis, as well as a 12 liter Kuhn Rikon. When I got my Fagor, Costco was offering 10 quart Fagors with canning kits for a little more than the price of a good induction adapter disk. My Fagor came with an instruction and recipe book for pressure canning, and I have used it for some small batch pressure canning with induction. The 12 quart Kuhn Rikon will work for pressure canning, as well, although it is more cumbersome to manually bleed off air as it it nears pressure, so I don't use it much for that. I use them at altitude (5600 ft.) following the advice from other local canners and the local Ag Extension which recommend increasing the time under pressure. The formula is to add 5% to the recipe time for every 1000 feet above 2000 feet. That said, I think angemoore might want to try the adapter disk for her pressure canner. The problem I've seen with adapter disks and canning has not been with pressure canners. The problem has been with large capacity water bath canners which have so much more water to heat. IME, pressure canning uses a whole lot less water than waterbath canning. Maybe a few quarts in the pressure canner as opposed to gallons in a water bath canner. Seems to me that it is the large quantity of liquid that makes the problem for water bath canning. There are people in my neighborhood who use 16 quart Prestos and 21 quart All American pressure canners on 8 inch diameter, 120 volt coil burner hot plates. (They move these to porches and garages so as to not add heat to the house in our hot late sumer-early fall days. ) If their pressure canners will work on those, it seems like they should work at least as well (if not better) on an adapter disk and a full-size cooktop's largest induction burner. That leads me to ask angemoore how big is your pressure canner? How much water do you use when pressure canning? What is the size of the biggest burner on your planned cooktop? Seems to me that, if your adapter plate's diameter is matched to the diameter of the base of your pressure canner and they are around the same diameter as induction burner, that set up should not have a problem getting and staying hot enough to maintain pressure. It might work okay but maybe a little slow. FWIW, when I researched this topic a few years ago, I found a lot of sites with bad advice. It seemed that many posters did not distinguish between water bath canning and pressure canning and often were referring to those thin-walled Graniteware waterbath pots with rippled bases which are problemmatic on any stove with a glass top. I also found that a lot of posters could not or would not differentiate induction from radiant electric. I mention these points because some models of radiant electric smoothtops defintely have had the kinds of problems you mentioned --- of not coming to heat or not properly maintaining heat with canners. Basically, the radiant burners get very hot, heating the glass top much hotter than the pans and that, combined with reflections from the large pot bases seems to confuse the sensors which cycle the radiant heat. The result was that some burners' over heat sensors shut them down and others slowed the cycling. At the time, I thought about getting a bigger All American but they use dial pressure gauges. According to Ag Extension, those gauges should be calibrated every year. Our county's Ag Extension office no longer offers that service and I do not do big enough batches of canning to really benefit from having one of the large capacity pressure canners. I got the Fagor, instead.
...See More
mellyofthesouth
18 years ago
You might want to consider a presto canner. They have a smaller disk on the bottom that lets you use it on a glass stove.
antiqueace
18 years ago
NO! Not all stainless 18/10 is induction ready.That is a huge error. In fact most USA cookware is not appropriate for an induction cooktop. If a magnet sticks to the bottom of the cookware it will work on a induction stove. I do not know of an induction compatible pressure canner available in the USA. I am not saying it does not. The pressure canners I am familiar with are aluminum.I do have a pressure cooker that can be used on induction it is German made. I am certain there are induction pressure canners in Europe. I have recently ordered a induction cooktop and will be in the market for a pressure canner. Someone mentioned copper doesn't work well on a induction cooktop. Copper does not work at all on a induction cooktop.I will let you know if I come up with a induction pressure canner. Ebay has induction cookware at restaurant supply stores be sure the listing specifically mentions "induction compatible" or "induction ready". Restaurant supply stores have it because many restaurants have induction hobs. Some of the HSN ultrex brand cookware is induction ready, but again be sure to ask. Some of the All Clad cookware is induction. Again, not all check at their website. Induction cooktops are making big news these days particularly since Sears just came out with one. The high end manufacturers have them but they are still quite expensive. I predict induction cooktops will almost replace conventional electric cooktops within 5 years. Prices are already beginning to fall. The premier Diva de Provence from Canada has come down in price. See their website for info on induction divadeprovenceinduction.com Also there is excellent information elsewhere at this site. I am new to this and can't direst you but it is there if you search.Cheers, Antiqueace
beaverlake
18 years ago
Perhaps you can find an answer at this web site. It's quite comprehensive. You might also try contacting some of the manufacturers. CookTek, for one, has a "line" of induction cookware. Finally - if one layer of a clad-bottom pan is copper, you get the benefit of copper heat distribution (just like aluminum sandwich).

Here is a link that might be useful: The Induction Site
partphyll
18 years ago
I can't find the forums which started with "induction cooktops -- wave of the future". Want to add the information that I've found someone who can repair them -- including my 1980's Sears model. Contact jhampton@cgiltd.com for more information

Partphyll
partphyll
18 years ago
P.S. As to cookware, I invested about $50.00 in Ikea pots and pans. They make a little clicking noise, but work great. I also have two thrift store cast iron pans which I use on a Silpat pad -- prevents scratching the cooktop.
txdianimal
17 years ago
Has anyone bought & used the Kenmore Induction Cooktop? If so, how is it working? Is it hard to find pans that work on it? Do the touch pad controls work ok-I read article somewhere (consumer reports??) that there was trouble/problems using the controls?? What about cleaning the top-does it scratch easy? Does it cook as great as advertised?

Here is a link that might be useful: Kenmore Induction Cooktop
alanrockwood
17 years ago
Fagor has a 10 qt unit described as a pressure cooker/canner. It works on induction cooktops. It is, however, a little on the small side, only holding 4 quart-size canning jars. Fagor's smaller pressure cookers also work on induction, but they are not for canning.
wyntermarie
17 years ago
Costco has the Fagor 6 quart express pressure canners for 49.99 in the Portland area! Says right on the cooker it is induction compatable.
weedmeister
16 years ago
This may not be the place, but I noticed at BB&B the other day that Circulon has come out with a line of induction cookware. I bought some non-stick frypans since they were cheaper than the AllClad.
zeuspaul
16 years ago
I just bought a Cadco 1500 watt single burner (pricey $125+/-) as a fifth burner for a pressure canner. My cooktop is four burner propane. It gets too crowded with all the large stock pots boiling down the tomato sauce in the canning process. The wife gets a little upset when she wants to cook dinner at the same time!!

I haven't used it for the canner yet. However it came in useful for the tomato sauce. I have to stir constantly with propane when the sauce starts to thicken. This burner with a cast iron surface gives a very even heat. I can leave the sauce without stirring while eating dinner.

I use a 20 qrt stainless pot on it. It doesn't seem like there is very much waste heat to me.

I am sure it will work with the pressure canner. It will be slower getting up to speed.

I may get one more! This thing will also work well as a warmer while entertaining.

Zeuspaul

Pressure canners and induction stove tops?

Comments (12)

smokey98042

ksrogers

Related Discussions

mellyofthesouth

antiqueace

beaverlake

partphyll

partphyll

txdianimal

alanrockwood

wyntermarie

weedmeister

zeuspaul

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US