Gadgets with Gaskets

We inherited a wonderful gift from the Huz's folks--his mom's 22-quart pressure canner. From what we remember our folks doing and the directions we got from the Ball Blue Book, we know how to can our own veggies. We have the equipment and the knowledge to do it safely, and with the availability of free produce from the community garden and gifts of fruit, etc. from friends and acquaintances, we've been able to put by a fair amount of food for the winter. I can safely say that we don't need any more jam! I would like to have the wherewithal to can peaches and applesauce next. Thanks to the community garden, we've nearly got enough beans, and were even able to put away a few pints of peas. With any luck, we'll get a decent number of tomatoes this year from our own garden, but we'll see how that goes. I need a certain number to be ripe all at once in order to actually process them as canned tomato sauce or juice.

The other challenges we've had other than coming in between bean harvests has been time to do the canning, and problems with our canner's gasket/seal. Our canner was made by the Mirro company prior to 1983, and requires a very specific gasket. We have model M-0622. All the info online says that the correct gasket for this canner was the S-9882 model. However, after so many of these gaskets failed and became rippled or limp, we got frustrated and contacted the company directly. They responded to the Huz's email and told us that the correct gasket for our model of canner was in fact the S-3440, not the other one. I tried to get this gasket through Ace, the only local place where they actually sell canner parts, and the only one they had in their inventory was the other one--the wrong one we'd been using and hating for so many years. So I went online and found the correct gasket and ordered it in. $14.00 and a few days later, we had a new gasket, which looks similar to the others but ever so slightly different. It's a little thicker, for one thing, and the rubber curves outward just a touch. We tried it today to see how it would do, and lo and behold, a perfect seal. No dripping water from under the sides of the canner lid, no hissing, no trouble getting the canner up to pressure. Perfect.

Now, why the original misinformation as to which seal was the correct one for this model of canner? It seems to be a relatively uncommon model of canner, but still.... Just in case anyone else has been experiencing this frustration, the correct gasket for the model M-0622 Mirro-Matic 22 quart pressure canner is the gasket formerly known as the S-3440, now known as just the 3440. It is available from a company called Red Mill, as well as a couple others. Google "pressure canner gasket 3440," and you should readily find a place to buy one online. Good luck, and I sympathize! This gasket actually works; trust me.

Be Kind to the Beans

We've had an interesting time this summer, both in keeping ourselves fed, bills paid, etc. The most interesting part is that we've been so blessed and so fortunate in the food department. The nearby community garden we've become involved with has provided us with nearly enough beans to get us through the upcoming winter months. We've canned many quarts of beans from that community garden, even though most of the harvesting happened when the beans were past their first flush of production. Fortunately the garden people waited and did not till over the beans as they'd proposed doing, for now they seem to be gearing up for a second production run.

The only trouble we've had lately has been that people are not careful when they go through the bean patch. They seem to think that it doesn't matter how rough they are with the bean bushes, and often they end up pulling up the entire bush, or breaking off so many branches when they go for the green beans that the poor plant ends up nearly dead afterward. It's a shame that people aren't better educated about where their food comes from or even in the simple concept that if you want a plant to produce more food for you over the course of a growing season, it's important to make sure you don't kill the plant the first time you harvest from it. It's frustrating to go along a row and see the swath of devastation someone else cut in their eagerness to get at a few fresh beans for their dinner. From what I've heard from others this year, many people don't have much of an idea how to grow their own vegetables, so they go by trial and error, as if this were a new technology they're learning. And many don't have any more idea of how to preserve their harvest than simply to stick food in freezer bags and throw them into the freezer, when often freezer space is at a premium for most folks. The few lucky ones, like the Huz and I, grew up with parents or grandparents who grew and canned their own vegetables. The rest are pretty clueless, I'm sorry to say.