preppingsu wrote:The phase is best before. After that the food will start to deteriate so the flavour may go. But at the end of the day food is food, ,you could just add some herbs/spices to pick up the flavour.
There may have been even damage to the tin for it to 'explode'.
Try to avoid ring pull cans for long term storage.
Food wise: buy only what you will eat and make sure you rotate. Even if you don't normally eat tinned food every now and again you'll need to have a week for two incorporating them into your diet.
I've kind of started eating more tinned stuff so I can justify storing them, a bit arse about face really but we didn't really eat much tinned stuff apart from baked beans and tuna. Even soups were usually home made. I now eat what I store more but a lot of it is fairly cheap stuff so not really a huge issue, I do try and keep an eye on the amount of salt in things though, there's a fair amount in some stuff.
This is our problem too - I find myself eating food we'd never normally eat, simply because it is in tins in the stock and I haven't found a way to rotate/store effectively.
I recently opened a couple of cans of Asda hotpot which were 2013 and pretty rank-smelling - there was a large void in the can, suggesting the contents had shrunk, and although not off as such, the contents smelt sour. However as I never normally eat tinned hot-pot I have no way of knowing whether this is normal!
I am going to concentrate on tins of tomatoes and spam, and bags of lentils, I think : )
The sour smell is caused by bacteria: Bacillus stearothermophilus, Bacillus licheniformis, Bacillus coagulans, Bacillus macerans, and Bacillus subtilis.
In the canning world it's called 'flat sour', they are not dangerous. So if you are scavenging for food don't throw it away!
I recently got into canning food. We can chicken and beef and make up curries, bolognese etc.., the meat has less texture more like pulled pork but it tastes great, I prefer it to fresh meat now. The meats can last 20+ years in the right conditions. We looked into soups and the best way to store tomato soup is without the thickeners just the toms and juice and then add thickeners/butter etc.. when you're ready to eat. If the can's exploded there must have been a micro organism turning the food into a gas which is normally botulism which you really don't want to eat.
bunkai wrote:I recently got into canning food. We can chicken and beef and make up curries, bolognese etc.., the meat has less texture more like pulled pork but it tastes great, I prefer it to fresh meat now. The meats can last 20+ years in the right conditions. We looked into soups and the best way to store tomato soup is without the thickeners just the toms and juice and then add thickeners/butter etc.. when you're ready to eat. If the can's exploded there must have been a micro organism turning the food into a gas which is normally botulism which you really don't want to eat.
Not been on my canning journey for long at all and not yet canned meat. I have canned chicken stock though and that's tasty. Also a few jars of fruits and a lot of veggies, everything is yum so far.
I need to take the plunge with meats though, my own spag bol sauce will be first I think! What do you put in your sauce and how large are the jars you can?
No thickeners I.e flour based should be canned, nor sage as it turns bitter.
Behind every great man is an even greater woman. She carried you, raised you and made you who you are.
bunkai wrote:I recently got into canning food. We can chicken and beef and make up curries, bolognese etc.., the meat has less texture more like pulled pork but it tastes great, I prefer it to fresh meat now. The meats can last 20+ years in the right conditions. We looked into soups and the best way to store tomato soup is without the thickeners just the toms and juice and then add thickeners/butter etc.. when you're ready to eat. If the can's exploded there must have been a micro organism turning the food into a gas which is normally botulism which you really don't want to eat.
Not been on my canning journey for long at all and not yet canned meat. I have canned chicken stock though and that's tasty. Also a few jars of fruits and a lot of veggies, everything is yum so far.
I need to take the plunge with meats though, my own spag bol sauce will be first I think! What do you put in your sauce and how large are the jars you can?
No thickeners I.e flour based should be canned, nor sage as it turns bitter.
We are still noobs too, only been canning for a couple of months, we are still working out how best to can the sauce so I don't have any specifics yet. We sample everything we 'can' to check that we actually like it and to gain some faith in the process before we run off a big batch. We use the Ball 945ml Jars from Lakeland for the meat and will probably go with the same size for the sauce. They are just the right size for a family of four adults. We raw pack the meat and do not soak the lids.
We don't currently grow anything ourselves so it's only really the meats and sauces that make sense at the moment, but I am looking forward to canning fuits and veggies when we move.
Deeps wrote:I'm still eating proper evening meals but I'm having 'bad' lunches, a tin of meatballs or ravioli or beans & sausages with diced and shallow fried tatties. I put dried leeks, onions and chilli in the sauce, tastes great and its proper unhealthy, mmmm. I wouldn't want to be eating like that 3 times a day, I enjoy my proper food too much but the tinned stuff isn't as bad as I'd feared, especially when its 'sexed up.
That sounds much more sensible! Maybe I'll fit in some 'proper' food for now for the sake of my insides! I agree on the taste front too, turns out I quite like most tinned foods. Dried stuff can get a bit bland but as you said, there's nothing stopping you adding flavour elsewhere...
