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keitherize

Fear of Botulism in my canned muscadine Grape Juice?

keitherize
7 years ago

Hi all, This is my first time posting to the forums and also my first time canning. I will admit that I was nervous at first when deciding to can muscadine juice. I followed, (I thought) the instructions for "canning muscadine juice the easy way" to the "T". I rinsed my grapes,I washed and sterilized my jars in the dishwasher, I washed my lids and rings. What I did is, I placed my whole grapes and sugar in quart jars, and poured in the almost rolling boiling water to a half inch head space for each jar. I then placed all my jar in my pressure canner and pressure canned for 10 min at 5lbs of pressure. I believe it was almost 20 min though because once I turned off the heat, the regulator was still rocking for another 10 min. I think I had my heat too high? Anyways, All seemed well, After I removed my jars, I heard all of my lids "pop" that same evening after I was finished. The next day, I checked my lids, and they all are sealed properly and tight. So all is good right? I had visions of enjoying my muscadine juice for thanksgiving and sharing with my family. But, then I started thinking and researching more on canning, and I started seeing this scary term "Botulism". So I did more research about how imperative it is to follow safe canning procedures. So then I began to replay my process in my mind and found some discrepancies with what I did compared to "proper canning procedures". The one thing that is bothering me the most, is I DID NOT allow my pressure canner to vent a steady "funnel" of steam for 10 mins. Instead, I saw steam coming out over a period of 10 mins or more, but it was not steady. Another thing I DID NOT do is place my lids and bands in simmering hot water after washing, I just left them on the counter before placing them on the jars. And one more thing, the grapes I used were a few days old, they were still good, but the "fresh picked" plumpness was missing in some of them but not all. Anyone would have still eaten them, so they were definitely good for consumption, and very tasty! But my question is this, do I have to fear that my juice is bad or toxic from botulism? Can/should I reprocess the juice a few days later? one part of me says that it should be ok, since normally the recipe calls for a boiling water bath. Surely, my pressure canner got to high enough temperatures. Right? But also what about not simmering the lids and bands? Someone please help me with this dilemma, I would hate to waste all of those good grapes. Do I need to worry? Thanks in advance for all of the help!

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