Canning in Chicago?

I know we have a resident expert on canning but where can I actually take a class on canning? Does the Chicago area even host a community canning event?

I'm a hands on kind of gal who doesn't like to muck up my own kitchen, KWIM?

HI,

University of Illinois Extension in Chicago has the Master Food Preserver program that is headed by Drusilla Banks. Susan Brewer PhD of U of I designed the Master Food Preserver program maybe 15 years ago. Susan did step-by-step video tapes, which were and maybe still are available for sale. If you can get those tapes and the manual, then you will have a quality education in canning.

I feel very fortunate to have learned food preservation from Linda Eilks who followed Susan's instructions to the letter. Not all extension instructors followed Susan's methods, instead some took departures from the tutorial. At my suggestion, we had two Master Food Preservers state-wide meetings in Champaign. When it was first proposed, there were people who believe it would be five people, instead it was fully subscribed with a waiting list. Thirty women spent two days in kitchens testing various canning methods and evaluating the product. For instance, we canned chicken with and without bones. I cannot recall the outcome without finding my notes, though I know there was a distinct taste difference.

University of Georgia hosts the federally funded National Preservation for Home Preservation. I have met Elizabeth Andress who oversees this website as well as the publications So Easy to Preserve and involved in USDA Complete Guide to Home Canning. These two publications are my bibles for home food preservation. I have the Ball Book, though I go back to the USDA Guide for processing time.

I have heard of community canning events where there are large Later Day Saint communities. They bring in autoclaves to process the goods. I don't know if they do this around here.

Mucked up kitchens, sore feet and steamy heat go hand-in-hand with the canning experience. Susan Brewer commented when she was in graduate school, she canned on her patio using a hot plate to keep her home cool. Bruce has suggested using a turkey fryer set-up for processing canned goods outside.

Regards,

It is rapidly becoming a dying art.

Hi,

One year I went to Best of Midwest Farmer's Market held at Ravinia Festival. I collected over 150 names of people desiring information and/or classes on food preservation. I stupidly gave it to someone who lost it without photocopying it first.

While there may not be the necessity to preserve food today. Those who really want to practice eating local in the midwest, then some sort of home food preservation comes to play.

Several of my canning friends and I had this idea to travel the country in a motorhome canning foods at peak season. I began to wonder how to keep these jars. Would we have to abandon our hard earned efforts while crossing the Rockies like Lucille Ball and Desi Arnez in the The Long, Long Trailer? Nutty as it sounds it was given serious consideration for quite a while.

Regards,

My next-door neighbor, who passed away last month, kept telling me she was going to show me how to do it. For years, she would teach groups of girl scouts how to can and we were the lucky recipients of some of her home canned goods each fall when her husband was alive and kept a garden. I'm kicking myself now for not taking her up on the offer earlier.

Suzy

It looks like more people would want to learn than not. Love the motorhome idea, BTW.