The Basics of Home Canning and How to Get Started—Quick & Easy!

August 17, 2022/Updated April 13, 2024/17 Comments/in Food and Recipes, Home & Family /by Mary Hunt

So, you planted a garden, lucked out when your property included fruit trees, stumbled upon a produce sale you just couldn’t pass up or joined a CSA. Good for you! Now what? What will you do with all that bounty?

Your choices are 1) quickly consume your harvest before it spoils 2) give it away or 3) preserve it to enjoy in the future. One of the best ways to preserve—the method of food preservation that is making a big comeback—is known as “home canning.” Canning is not tricky, but it is a procedure that should be followed precisely.

Home Canning Overview

Generally, the process begins by sterilizing canning jars in boiling water. Then, once you’ve filled them with hot jam or another prepared recipe and applied lids, you boil them again. Proper canning or “heat-processing” hermetically seals the jar, meaning no air or tiny organisms can get in. It also kills any undesirables that may be present, like bacteria, yeast, or mold. In addition, it destroys naturally occurring enzymes that cause food to spoil.

For this process, known as home canning, you need a few pieces of equipment, a little time, and beautifully ripe produce. Your investment will pay off in spades come winter when you can enjoy summer all over again.

Beginners should start with fruit, jams, pickles, and tomatoes because these items are highly acidic and do not require a pressure canner—a process used for low-acid vegetables like green beans using high pressure plus high heat.

How to Can

1. Sterilize the jars, lids, and rings

In a big cooking pot filled with water, place jars and lids in the water and bring to a boil over high heat. Allow boiling for 10 minutes. Keep jars hot by turning heat down to simmer until ready to fill.

2. Make the recipe

Use one of the recipes below or another recipe of your choice that has been created specifically for canning. Again, if you are a beginning canner, start with a nice jam recipe or fruit in syrup.

3. Carefully remove jars from the pot

Empty the hot water from each jar back into the pot so you won’t have to heat new water later.

4. Place jars on a wooden cutting board or towel

Placing jars on a cold countertop could cause thermal shock, which could crack the jars. Place the funnel in the mouth of the jar; carefully ladle in the food item you have just prepared.

5. Fill jars allowing for headspace

The empty space between the food’s top and the jar’s top is called headspace. The amount of space depends on what you’re canning. Your recipe should indicate the amount of headspace required by that particular item.

6. Release air bubbles

Air bubbles can prevent jars from sealing and may affect the color of canned goods. Get rid of bubbles by sliding a nonmetal spatula or something like a plastic chopstick between the food and the inside of the jar. Make sure the item you use has been sterilized. You don’t want to introduce bacteria once you’ve been so careful to sterilize everything.

7. Clean up jars

Wipe jar rim and threads (the grooves the lid screws onto) with a clean, damp cloth. Food left on the jar rim or threads might prevent the jar from sealing once the lid and ring have been applied.

8. Apply lids and rings

With tongs, transfer one jar lid from the hot water to the top of each jar, ensuring it is centered perfectly on top of the jar. Apply a screw ring to each jar and twist until it is just finger-tight. Do not over tighten. The ring is to hold the lid in the correct position so that the seal can take place as the contents of the jar cool.

9. Process

Now, you are ready to process the jars. Place them back into the large pot of hot water. Once all the jars that will fit are in the pot, add enough water to cover the jars by at least one inch. Cover the pot and bring the water to a rapid boil over high heat. Boil jars for the required “processing time” indicated in your recipe of choice. For proper canning, water must boil rapidly during the entire processing time.

11. Turn off the heat

Remove lid from the large pot. Let jars cool in the water for five minutes. Remove jars from the pot, being careful not to tilt the jars. Place them on a towel. Allow sitting undisturbed for 24 hours.

12. Test for proper seal

To test each jar to make sure it is properly sealed, look at the lid from the side. It should be concave, slightly curved like the inside of a bowl. Next, press on the lid with your finger. If the lid springs back, the jar is not sealed. Immediately reprocess that jar or refrigerate it to be consumed within the next few days. The contents are perfectly edible and delicious, but, since it did not seal properly, you would not want to put it on the shelf to be eaten six months from now.

13. Label and store

Make and apply labels for your jars that indicate the name of the contents and the date canned. Store in a cool, dark, non-humid place for up to one year.

Basic Equipment

Home canning jars

These are specially made, tempered jars with lids designed for canning. The jars can be reused for many years, but you will always want to use new lids (super cheap, easy to find).

Canning jars come in various sizes and are usually sold in boxes of 6 or 12. Each jar includes a two-piece lid. Look for canning jars online, in supermarkets, hardware stores, and discount department stores like Walmart and Target.

This set of twelve 32-oz (quart) jars with lids and rings is perfect for jams, jellies, and pickles.

Wide Mouth Mason Jars 32 oz with Lids and Bands Set of 12 Jars

Large covered water bath canner

A water bath canner must be deep enough to completely immerse the jars with 1 to 2 inches of water covering the top of the lids. Canners have a rack to keep the jars off the bottom of the pot. You can improvise by using any large stockpot with a wire cooling rack or trivet placed in the bottom.

12-Quart Canner/Steel Stock Pot with Lid

Jar lifter

A jar lifter is a very handy tong-like tool for removing freshly processed jars from the boiling water without tilting them. It looks like wide tongs.

Home Canning Jar Lifter

Wide mouth canning funnel

A canning funnel makes filling your jars simple in a safe and tidy way.

Collapsible Canning Funnel Set

A non-metallic spatula

You want to avoid anything metallic from coming in contact with your prepared food item, so use a non-metallic spatula, a long plastic knife, or chopstick to run through the filled jars to release trapped air bubbles.

Linens

Clean dishcloths or small towels to wipe the rims before placing the lids on the jars and a heavy dish towel or absorbent mat to set the hot jars on after they’ve been removed from the canner.

MORE: Peaches—Tips, Tricks, and My Grandmother’s Peach Cobbler

Resources

Pick-Your-Own Farms Near Me

This is a useful website that will help you find local pick-your-own orchards and farms in your local area.

National Center for Home Food Preservation

This NCHFP offers free, comprehensive information that covers every aspect of canning and food preservation. You can take self-study courses, and find the answers to just about any question you can imagine.

Free USDA Complete Guide to Home Canning

This free guide contains complete instructions for how to can peaches, plums, cherries, nectarines, and vegetables like peppers, beans, okra, and corn. You’ll need a pressure canner to process low-acid vegetables at 240 F.

Books

Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving, by Judi Kingry, is considered by many to be the bible of home canning. This book includes comprehensive directions on safe canning and preserving methods plus lists of required equipment and utensils. Specific instructions for first-timers and handy tips for the experienced make the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving a valuable addition to any kitchen library. It also includes 400 enticing recipes.

Save $11.02

Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving

Canning for a New Generation: Bold, Fresh Flavors for the Modern Pantry, by Liana Krissoff. A hip, modern guide to home canning, chock-full of approachable, time-tested, accurate recipes, and intriguing new flavor pairings. In this Updated and Expanded Edition, Krissoff includes 50 new recipes for food preservation in addition to her favorites.

Canning for a New Generation

Website

The Simply Canning website is designed so that even a beginner can fill a pantry! The site offers hundreds of recipes created specifically for home canning, plus lots of instruction, helps, tips and tricks.

Home Canning Kit

The Granite Ware Canning Essentials Kit, 8-Piece Set includes a 21-quart canner, lid, 7-jar rack, bubble remover, jar lifter, lid wrench, funnel, tongs, and magnetic lid lifter—everything needed to begin canning (except the jars), at a price much lower than if you acquire each of the essential items separately. Look for similar kits at stores like Walmart and Target.

Granite Ware Canning Set, 11-Piece

Fabulous Starter Recipes

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

5 from 3 votes

Blushing Peach Jam

A decadent blend of peaches and raspberries with just a hint of almond ... oh my! This is the jam you will want in the middle of winter. So easy to make and preserve so that you can enjoy it many, many months from now. Or ... Holiday Gifts!

Prep Time20

Cook Time40

Total Time1

Course: Condiment

Cuisine: American

Servings:

Calories: 89kcal

Ingredients

2 cups peaches peeled, pitted, and crushed
2 cups red raspberries crushed
1/4 cup lemon juice
7 cups granulated white sugar
1 6-oz. liquid fruit pectin
few drops almond extract

Instructions

Sterilze jars and lids in boiling water or dishwasher on hottest "sterlize" setting.
In the meantime, to the peaches add 2 tablespoons lemon juice. Let stand while preparing raspberries.
Add the remaining 2 tablespoons lemon juice to the raspberries.
Combine peaches and raspberries with sugar in a heavy saucepan. Mix well and bring to a boil. Boil hard for 1 minute.
Remove from heat and add pectin. Stir and skim; add a few drops of almond extract.
Pour into hot jars leaving 1/4-inch headspace.
Process in boiling bath for 10 minutes. Yield: 4 half-pint jars jam.

Nutrition

Tasty home canning caramel apple jam in glass jars.

Tasty apple and cinnamon jams in glass jars.

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

4.67 from 6 votes

Caramel Apple Jam

Autumn in a jar! Sweet, buttery apples with warm cinnamon and nutmeg, perfect on toast, stirred into oatmeal, or drizzled over ice cream. A cozy, versatile jam that’s also a thoughtful homemade gift.

Prep Time45

Cook Time10

Optional: Cooling/settling time before tasting1

Total Time1 55

Course: Condiment, Spread

Cuisine: American

Servings: half-pint jars (about 91 tablespoons)

Calories: 50kcal