As a certified canning instructor, is sounds like you could use a refresher coarse and there is one available free from the National Center for Home Food Preservation - http://nchfp.uga.edu/.  You are taking some very big food safety risks, and your "bossy" sister is right. Take the Self-Study Coarse and bring your canning practices up-to-date. BTW - please don't use or share any of your home canning with anyone until you take the self-study coarse, or at least read the canning information in a recent copy Ball Blue Book of Canning.

The first rule of canning I teach is to only use TESTED recipes, which you will find at the NCHFP and the Ball Blue Book (the only commercial canning book that follows the USDA food safety standards). There are more bacteria than even 20-years ago, and more DEADLY bacteria, so you really need to up-date your canning practices.

Sorry, but bossy sister is right. Anything with meat/fish including stocks need to be pressure canned.

Get your self the latest Ball Blue Book and follow it carefully to be safe. Till then, freeze the bird!

Well, I'm not gonna tell my sister THAT, although she was the one who said I HAD to get a pressure/canner for meat stuff. Have been using it for things like chili, stew, meat sauces for several years... ain't dead yet. It's not like using pressure canner is "difficult". It just takes longer but will only handle pint jars. The bird I'll eat, the broth... LITERALLY no space in freezer. Not exactly soup weather here in NJ but just can't toss the broth. Will have to find some way to use at least most of it in next few days... for rice instead of water always works.

Do you think you could possibly borrow a pressure canner from a friend/family member until you can get your own? They once loaned/rented them out at the County Extension Offices, so that's another place to check. In fact, give them a call at the Extension Office with your question above and have them send you some of the free handouts they have available.

I hope you take your sister, pkramer60, and me seriously and learn how to do your canning safely and properly. "Ain't dead yet" isn't good enough when it comes to food safety. How are you at playing Russian Roulette?

I have a pressure cooker/canner that I bought several years ago when first told I was "flirting with death". I know how to use it and have successfully canned "meat" products in the past. Just wanted to know if the "pressure" part was absolutely necessary for broth/stock.

And your answer is yes, absolutely necessary ;-) Quarts, 25 min at 11 pounds of pressure my altitude, which is sea level.

I probably would not bring out one of my canners for a quart. I'd find a way to get a quart in a zip lock bag, envelope flat, into a freezer by some means.

klseiverd, did I understand you to say your canner will only accommodate pint jars? If so, it's smaller than the recommended size for pressure canning in jars and doesn't meet NCHFP guidelines. Which are - large enough for 4 quart jars on a rack and the lid closed appropriately. That's about a 12 qt capacity minimum size. My 8 qt Mirro will hold 5 wide mouth pts, but barely misses being able to close the lid on 4 quarts so is considered only adequate for pressure cooking loose foods.

Pressure canning raises the temperature way above water bath boiling point of 212F. When held there under pressure for the specified time the bacteria, mold, spores, and other bad stuff are killed. You cannot kill them with boiling water bath method, it is just not hot enough, no matter how long it is - a constant week and you still would not kill the buggers. With 240-250F in a pressure canner for a specified length of time per the NCHFP guidelines, everything is safely killed. If you do get the temperature up but don't follow the times needed, you are just gambling and under-processing results in not all the buggers being killed. It is the combination of trapped heated air pressure and the time needed for the food to be held there at that temperature that make the food safe to put on your shelf.

You wouldn't want to put a jar of raw meat or even cooked meat on the pantry shelf to be eaten a month later would you? Nor would you have it in the refrigerator for a month. Why? Because it becomes toxic. That stuff you would know is not good because of the smell. But ---- Botulism has NO smell !!!!!!! Not properly canned meat products result in a perfect environment for it to go from botulinum spores to botulisim toxin. No amount of cooking later will kill the buggers, as was the wrong old wives tale about cooking it for 15 minutes after BWB. The toxin has already started and multiplying and won't be killed at 212F - even if you boiled it for a week.

How much of a life gamble do you want to take for a couple dollars worth of chicken broth? If you literally don't have a space for it - give it to the neighbor's dog, or cook rice, make soup, keep it in the fridge for a few days, or just put it down the drain. Your bossy sister does not want to pay for a funeral.

Nancy

One more voice here, telling you that bossy sister is right. If you want to can meat/poultry/fish or broth/stock from them or low acid vegetables that aren't pickles, you need to pressure can them to do it safely.

"Not dead yet" isn't a valid argument for me. I rode to Canada from Michigan in the back of a pick up truck with a topper (not a camper). None of us had child safety seats, some cars didn't even have seatbelts at all. I didn't die, but it doesn't mean that I don't wear my seatbelt or that I'd let my girls or the grandkids ride to Canada in the back of a pickup. Sometimes we just learn better later in life. I've also stopped doing things like breaking wild horses and rolling downhill inside metal barrels, LOL.

The Ball Blue Book has been requiring pressure canning for meat products since the 40s, even my own Grandmother canned stock with a pressure canner, so it's been done for a long time.

So, break out that pressure canner, or make some rice!

Annie

I would take something out of the freezer for dinner tomorrow and free up space for a quart of broth.

I pressure can a lot of venison, rabbit, squirrel and fish. Mine is done at 10lb pressure for 90 minutes in pint, never quart jars.

That being said, I know a guy that uses a water bath canner for meat. They boil theirs for about 3 hours on a stove top from what I recall him saying. His family has done this for many generations, and are all as healthy as hogs….I wouldn't chance it personally, but apparently it can, it has, and it is still being done to this day by some folks.

klseiverd, I am a certified food preserver and like all the others on here will tell you to not wbc meat, broths or anything containing these. Pressure can only. Its like playing Russian Roulette not to. Another question, is your pressure canner actually a canner or a pressure cooker? There is a big difference and pressure cookers are not good enough to safely pressure can in. I've been preserving for over 50 years and like everyone else on here I think we know what's acceptable and what isn't. Yes, some of the ways that were used "way back when" have been proven not safe and although I know some of us or our parents or grandparents used those methods, but have learned why not to use them as the science of canning and preserving has progressed in time.

Madonna