While the Hubby's away I play

Canned Ground Beef

Yesterday in the morning I ordered 15 pounds of choice, ground round from a new, local butcher shop.  Well, actually they have been here awhile, but I rarely drive by their locale (it is on the way to Reno) and have been out of town so much (almost a month in Georgia,  two trips to Salt Lake, a trip to San Pedro for a delightful wedding for a delightful cousin, a family camping trip near Beaver, Utah and a week at Disneyland (I think that is all))! I didn't realize or remember they were there.  But I digress.  On the way home from Reno I picked it up.  It was 5:00 pm and thought it was too late to start canning ground beef.  At 7:00 pm with no hubby at home, I thought it wasn't too late to can 15 pounds of ground beef.  Later I would realize I was wrong but.....

Since I like my canned meat with some flavor, I chopped up 6 onions and 8 celery stalks.  I cooked my ground meat in 2 1/2 pound increments using two frying pans. To each pan I added one chopped onion and a handful of chopped celery.

Notice the indispensable black tool.  This tool easily turns ground beef or sausage into just the right consistency of crumbles.  I purchased mine from Joyce L., my Pampered Chef consultant.  She lives in Southern Nevada if you want to buy this tool let me know, and I will give you her contact info.

 I cooked the meat until there was no more pink.  I moved the meat into a large roaster with my spider (this drained the fat and liquid I didn't want in my finished product) and kept it warm in the oven on very low heat.  This process took me about 45 minutes.

While the meat was cooking, I prepared my jars and lids and began heating the water in my pressure canner.  After the meat was cooked, I took my jars out of the dishwasher and placed them on a towel next to my stove.  I dropped one beef bouillon cube into each pint jar.  I filled each jar with the cooked ground beef.  I pushed the meat down but didn't pack it too tightly.  I filled each jar with boiling water leaving a generous 1 inch headspace.  I cleaned the jar tops with a paper towel wet with water then a paper towel wet with vinegar.  The tops need to be fat free to get a good seal.

I got 16 pints of meat canned and had another 7 pints that didn't fit into my canner so I just froze them.  This little project lasted until after 11:00 pm.  Too late in my book.  I won't start that late again!  But, oh joy, to awake to all those beautiful bottles of yummy canned meat.  I went to the butcher shop and ordered another 20 pounds of choice, ground round for $2.99  a pound.  This will be next Friday's grand adventure.

I canned the meat according to recommended times and pressure for my area.  Below are some links to canning meat websites.

http://nchfp.uga.edu/how/can_05/ground_chopped.html
http://www.gopresto.com/recipes/canning/meat.php