A Beginner’s Guide to Bottling Fruit and Vegetables

With tips on How to Prepare and Preserve Food for Long-Term Use

Table of Contents

Introduction

Rules of Bottling

Types of Jars and Bottles

Sterilizing Tips

Equipment Necessary for Bottling

Methods of Sterilization

Hot Water Bath Method

Hot-Water Sterilization – Quick Method

Oven Method

Second Oven Method

Boiling Tomatoes

Tomato in Their Own Juice

Preserving Tomatoes in Brine

Tomato Purée

Tomato Juice

Bottling Methods for Vegetables

Blanching and Sterilizing Process for Vegetables

Water Bath Method

Acid Brine – Lemon Juice Method

Using Bottled Vegetables

Preparation of Fruit and Temperature Chart

Timetable for Sterilizing Vegetables in Pressure Cooker

Conclusion

Author Bio-

Introduction

We are everlastingly grateful to that homemaker millenniums ago, who decided that she needed to preserve food, for the coming winter. That was a little step for her, but it was a giant step for mankind. Soon people began to preserve food in stoneware jars.

The principle of preserving these fruit/food items depended firstly upon the destruction by need of all the mold and bacteria in the air, fruit, or water. As technological development and experimental sciences began to develop in ancient civilizations, they discovered how to make glass containers and bottles more than 5000 years ago.

Naturally, at the same time, the cook in the kitchen was experimenting on food stuffs. It was only by trial and error that she learned that if she kept items of food in a moist atmosphere, it would soon grow moldy and perish real fast. Also, she learned that the exclusion of air during the sealing off the bottles prevented this mold from growing on the surface of the food.

Along with that, she found out that salt, vinegar, wine and oil were extremely useful mediums in which she could preserve food, and that is how the art of been a preserving food in the shape of jams, jellies, pickles and chutneys came into existence. So this art has come down to us through the ages, and that is why many families have closely guarded secret recipes for pickling or preserving food. And that is when our grannies told us in grave tones – “remember, children, the containers in which you put this jam should be totally sealed really properly. That is how you are going to keep it for a long time.”

Natural vinegar and natural oil was used as an important medium since ancient times to preserve fruit, pickles and other natural food items. Along with that, salt and sugar were used as preservatives.