# Canning venison



## Becka03 (Mar 29, 2009)

I have a friend that told me she was going to can some venison- I said Oh I didn't realize you pressure can? She said what? I am going to can it.. I said well you have a pressure canner right? She said no- I am going to just can it- 

I didn't want to be rude- so I stopped questioning- she said her MIL HWB venison all the time- just some salt and then hot water bath for 3 hours-

Is this possible to do safely?


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## IndyGardenGal (Apr 5, 2009)

Just because it has been done without botulism or worse doesn't make it safe. It cannot get hot enough in a HWB to be safe.


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## Ohio dreamer (Apr 6, 2006)

It's how it was done 50+ yrs (or more) ago when pressure caners weren't affordable. But you'll never catch me doing that.

Tests done by the "National Kitchen" has proven that water canning meat is not safe. Not sure how long ago that testing was done....but, I know it was more then 30 years ago.


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## 95bravo (Mar 22, 2010)

I had some pressure canned deer the other day. Wholly cow that stuff was awesome. My friend added a spoon fully of Garlic bullion base. Looked about like cat food, but the taste was great.
Soon as I pick up a pressure canner I'm going to do some myself. Has anyone ever canned sheep?
If you water bathed canned meat would it not be evident that it did not work when you opened it?


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## Becka03 (Mar 29, 2009)

I would never in a million years NOT pressure can meat- but I could tell she was starting to get irritated by my questions so I stopped- she even said- "Venison makes you end up in the bathroom anyway after you eat it"

funny it doesn't do that to me!
I had started to say low acid foods should be pressure canned- like corn, greenbeans, meats, beans ect- she looked at me like I was nuts-


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## PackerBacker (Jul 17, 2013)

Becka03 said:


> I have a friend that told me she was going to can some venison- I said Oh I didn't realize you pressure can? She said what? I am going to can it.. I said well you have a pressure canner right? She said no- I am going to just can it-
> 
> I didn't want to be rude- so I stopped questioning- she said her MIL HWB venison all the time- just some salt and then hot water bath for 3 hours-
> 
> Is this possible to do safely?


Yes but it has to be boiled for something like 6 hours in the canner and then boiled again after it's opened.

If you read deep into the USDA guidelines it spells it out.

After all that cooking it'd be just aboot pointless to eat.


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## Becka03 (Mar 29, 2009)

PackerBacker said:


> Yes but it has to be boiled for something like 6 hours in the canner and then boiled again after it's opened.
> 
> If you read deep into the USDA guidelines it spells it out.
> 
> After all that cooking it'd be just aboot pointless to eat.


seems like a waste- plus she is only doing it for 3 hours- 

For free meat- wasting that much electricity seems senseless


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## PackerBacker (Jul 17, 2013)

Becka03 said:


> seems like a waste- plus she is only doing it for 3 hours-
> 
> For free meat- wasting that much electricity seems senseless


How is it wasted and what difference does the purchase price of the meat make?


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## Becka03 (Mar 29, 2009)

Just seems that boiling on the stove- at a rolling boil for 6 hours- would be alot of electric- and then boil again before cooking? 
the meat she got was from someone in her family hitting it with a car- so it was free-


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## PackerBacker (Jul 17, 2013)

Becka03 said:


> Just seems that boiling on the stove- at a rolling boil for 6 hours- would be alot of electric- and then boil again before cooking?
> the meat she got was from someone in her family hitting it with a car- so it was free-


So it costs a few more nickels per jar to can. So what? What's canned meat worth if you have to buy it?

If it's free that just means one can spend more money processing it and it's still cheap.

(stable) Meat on the shelf is priceless.


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## IndyGardenGal (Apr 5, 2009)

Canning it in a HWB, no matter how long and even if you boil it for days after opening it, still isn't safe.


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## Becka03 (Mar 29, 2009)

PackerBacker said:


> So it costs a few more nickels per jar to can. So what? What's canned meat worth if you have to buy it?
> 
> If it's free that just means one can spend more money processing it and it's still cheap.
> 
> (stable) Meat on the shelf is priceless.


okay I think you are missing the whole point of my question and being combative- it isn't safe to HWB meat- even if for 6 hours- it is a waste of time and energy if you are going to kill your family with botulism..is my opinion..


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## dkhern (Nov 30, 2012)

id pressure can but if you boil bones for an 1.5 hr meat will fall off bone and is safe to eat. if you packed that meat into jars is a clean sanatized work area you would probally be ok. im not saying to be reckless but dont over thing it either


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## PackerBacker (Jul 17, 2013)

Becka03 said:


> okay I think you are missing the whole point of my question and being combative- it isn't safe to HWB meat- even if for 6 hours- it is a waste of time and energy if you are going to kill your family with botulism..is my opinion..


You asked if it was safe. Then stated you stated you'd never do it. THat's fine. I would not BWB meat either.

It's not a waste of time or energy if it works


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## Homesteader (Jul 13, 2002)

See, the reason it's not safe is, bot is not killed at 212 degrees F. You cannot kill it at that temp. How long you "boil" it doesn't fix the fact that it needs to be 240F for a specific amount of time.

This is the point that in my experience, people don't read or research enough. They figure, well, hey if I just boil it for hours and hours......but that doesn't get the temperature high enough.

The only way to get that temp above 240F is to add pressure to the process. This is why they created "pressure" canners.


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## Homesteader (Jul 13, 2002)

95bravo said:


> I had some pressure canned deer the other day. Wholly cow that stuff was awesome. My friend added a spoon fully of Garlic bullion base. Looked about like cat food, but the taste was great.
> Soon as I pick up a pressure canner I'm going to do some myself. Has anyone ever canned sheep?
> *If you water bathed canned meat would it not be evident that it did not work when you opened it?*


I added the bolding - no! some signs are created by various different bacteria. But BOT - it can be hidden: quoting from Leda Meridith:

"How dangerous is botulism? Very. You can't see it, smell it, or taste it, and just one teaspoon of the botulism toxin that is produced by _Clostridium botulinum_ would be enough to kill hundreds of thousands of people.

*Although a brisk boil destroys botulism bacteria and toxins, it is not hot enough to destroy the spores.* Now if you're going to eat the just-boiled food right away, that's okay. But if those spores are going to sit in a jar of incorrectly canned food on a shelf at room temperature, that could be a deadly problem.

What do I mean by "incorrectly canned"? I mean that something that should have been pressure canned was processed in a boiling water bath instead. The reason that is so important is that a pressure canner heats the food to _hotter than the temperature of boiling water_.* It gets the food all the way up to 240F/116C, which is hot enough to kill botulism spores.*


Here's why canning non-acidic foods in a boiling water bath is dangerous: The processing temperature in a boiling water bath cannot get hotter than 212F/100C, the temperature of boiling water at sea level. *So the bacteria are destroyed, but not the spores that can grow into more bacteria.*
_Clostridium_ _botulinum_ spores grow in an environment that has no air, is a temperature between 70F/21C and 110F/43C, and includes more than 35 percent moisture. Sound familiar? That's right - it's exactly the environment inside a canning jar of food stored in a kitchen cabinet at room temperature."


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