Taco Tuesday

So part of me is laughing at all the canning recipes, because we've always canned, I just haven't always included it on the blog.  Now granted we've done more since I hurt my eye and we've been forced in doors, but still.  It's 2016 who still cans food?  

I do. This way I know what is in the food, that it's good quality, no fillers, no words I can't pronounce.  It also has a huge upside in that so many of our meal are half prepared because I've canned a portion of our food.  I can boil spaghetti and add my canned quart jar of sauce that has hamburger meat, fresh tomatoes, onions, peppers and have a good meal in half the time.  Otherwise I would be defrosting meat or having to stop by the grocery store for whatever ingredient I forgot. 

So why put it on the blog?  That's simple, because I play around with different recipes and when I find a recipe I like then I generally re-use it.  But about half the time I don't have a clue what recipe I used.  So when I can add it to the blog, I have a link to the recipe I used and can recreate it or tweak it a little next time!  Also, I think food makes pretty, creative photos. 

At the store the other day I found ground beef and ground chicken on sale.  So that's what I cooked up today.  Generally you can get one pound of meat into a pint jar and two pounds into a quart jar.  I cooked up the meat in batches in my skillet and kept the cooked meat in a stock pot on low while my skillet was cooking another batch.  I had a total of about twenty pounds of meat.  To every two pounds of chicken and 2 pounds of beef I added two chopped onions and two chopped bell peppers.  

I seasoned the meat with salt and pepper, but no other spices. This way the meat could be used in enchilada, spaghetti, chili, tacos, etc.  I drain the fat off the meat before packing it into jars and then pack into sterilized jars, seal and pressure cook them at 10# pressure for 75 minutes (for pints).  General health guidelines say this canned ground hamburger (& chicken) will have a shelf life of 3-5 year.  I prepared ten pints and this will probably last us a couple of months. 

There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted Exodus 16:3