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feldon30 · June 9, 2015

Do them the way they've been done for 100 years with no trouble:

Hot pickles into hot jars with hot lids and rings, with everything having boiled at least once and everything kept hot and clean and wiped down until you're done.

The new methods are designed to be lawyerproof for people who cannot follow directions and forget to wipe the rim or cross-contaminate or don't have everything boiling or fail to measure things right or disturb/jostle the jars before they've sealed or otherwise they just plain don't follow the recipe!

I'm fairly new to canning but I am extremely meticulous/fastidious about having everything clean and boiling. I follow the Ball Blue Book recipe to a T and I've done two batches of Bread and Butter pickles, one batch of Sweet Lime pickles, and two batches of Blueberry Preserves and everything came out perfect. The lids all popped within a few minutes.

If you really want to do the "super safe" processing, then you can buy Pickle Crisp from Ball (green jar) which is what all major manufacturers use. You add like 1/4 tsp of calcium chloride powder per jar and it firms up the pickles.

June 9, 2015	#149
feldon30 Tomatovillian™ Join Date: May 2006 Location: Rock Hill, SC Posts: 5,346	Do them the way they've been done for 100 years with no trouble: Hot pickles into hot jars with hot lids and rings, with everything having boiled at least once and everything kept hot and clean and wiped down until you're done. The new methods are designed to be lawyerproof for people who cannot follow directions and forget to wipe the rim or cross-contaminate or don't have everything boiling or fail to measure things right or disturb/jostle the jars before they've sealed or otherwise they just plain don't follow the recipe! I'm fairly new to canning but I am extremely meticulous/fastidious about having everything clean and boiling. I follow the Ball Blue Book recipe to a T and I've done two batches of Bread and Butter pickles, one batch of Sweet Lime pickles, and two batches of Blueberry Preserves and everything came out perfect. The lids all popped within a few minutes. If you really want to do the "super safe" processing, then you can buy Pickle Crisp from Ball (green jar) which is what all major manufacturers use. You add like 1/4 tsp of calcium chloride powder per jar and it firms up the pickles. __________________ [SIZE="3"]I've relaunched my gardening website -- [B]TheUnconventionalTomato.com[/B][/SIZE] * [I][SIZE="1"]*I'm not allowed to post weblinks so you'll have to copy-paste it manually.[/SIZE][/I]