Buying machines for food storage

Has anyone tried those "6in1" cookers for pressure cooking during canning?
Saw them at BigW the other week and said they can pressure cook

That's a bugger then for the 6in1 for canning as that's what caught my eye on it. Already got a decent slow cooker, so will keep my eye out for a proper pressure cooker at an alright price.

- Stick a fork in your oven door set it to the lowest temp and you have a free dehydrator. I used oven trays. Otherwise pretty much any of them, they do the same thing, warm and blow air.

- You can do high acid canning such as tomatoes or vinegar based ones with any large pot, I use a soup pot for the sterilizing and whatever I cooked the batch in. Boil used pasta jars with the removed lid and I use tongs [and a proper jar remover] to pull out, a ladle to fill with the 'very hot' ingredients and then I tighten with a clean tea-towel. The used lids have a silicone seal on them that is reusable many times [probably indefinitely]. When the jars have cooled they will be vacuum sealed and opening them gives a satisfying 'pop'. Many preserves can be done this way.

- I got my pressure canner from Ozfarmer on special as mentioned by Peter, it's excellent, used it heaps, see posts. The 'All American' pressure canner is a better canner due to not needing rubber seals [aka lasts forever] and I think it's a little bigger and they're huge as it is. When I looked a while back Amazon seemed to have the best deal on it and I was sitting on the idea for ages until I saw that special and jumped at the chance and glad I did as I love to can and I've had zero issues with mine, either are highly recommend.

I suggest getting yourself 1/2 pint jars for 'meal sized' portions, unless you have larger families I suppose.  I personally prefer kmart drinking jars as they're super cheap $1.50, work great for soups [they have a handle] and I've only broken them because I put hot jars in cold water a couple of times.  Lids and rings you can get from BigW.  You only need as many rings as jars that will fit in your canner as you remove them after cooling though I suppose you could do a second batch one after the other, to which you might need 2 sets.   I have way too many lol.  As long as you don't bend them too much, the lids last many uses, which cuts down on cost and I've got enough to last me decades right now. Failed seals are usually due to over tightening, it only needs a lightly finger closed to seal properly.

- you can pressure can in a normal pressure cooker if they have a pressure regulator that allows you to set different pressures [thats all a canner is]. The main problem is that they're often too small and you'll want to be doing larger batches to save you time. I typically can about 6-9L of food [12-18 meals] at a time to give you an idea. I only do it about once a month now and I keep the cupboard full of ready to eat food no problem. We had to buy another cupboard and I keep about 80-100 meals stored.

- I tried vacuum sealing, hated it due to seals failing and it costs too much/unit of food for bulk storage. Might have been my unit however. I got a hand vacuum pump for Mason jars, which would do a similar job, the jars reusable though haven't used it.

They only seem to have this one now

ozfarmer.com/food-preserving-kits/complete-preserving-kits/The-Presto-Complete-Intermediate-Preserving-Kit

Technique 1: Water Bath Canning

Water bath canning is a shorter, lower-temperature canning process that is ideal for high-acid foods. The high acidity of the foods kills bacteria, allowing for the water bath method. Types of fruits and vegetables ideal for water bath preserving, include:

 - www.freshpreserving.com/canning-101-getting-started.html
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The reason high acid foods are ok in water bathing is that everything else except botulism spores are killed by your typically cooking/boiling temps no problem and the botulism spores can't survive/grow in a high acid environment.  Acid is a great preservative, hence pickled foods as an aside. 

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Lets called the blackened marks 'seasoning' the pot, haha.  I'm not even sure how you would ruin a pot, other than it's esthetics.  


Looks like the same one, trying to remember what I paid, something like $150 delivered with a few 1/4 pint jars. 

The extras you'll want and I'd recommend anyhow,
so the jars $25-35,
Blue book $15,
funnel $15,
Extra lids $8
- so it's similar value. 

I would highly recommend the tongs also
ozfarmer.com/ball-mason-premium-bottle-tongs-jar-lifter-ball-mason?search=tongs though I think I remember them being a little cheaper at big W. 

I've got it so I can can the food I desire and I MUCH rather doing this than sticking it in the freezer now for convenience and as a prepper an ability to continue to store excesses of foods when in season.  I'm not sure that at $200-400 investment [depending on the number of jars] is more economical than just storing tinned food. 

Hmm... interesting.  I was using the correct bags, the ones that came with the unit actually.  I think my main issue was the seals failing over time and that might have been my unit doing a crap job of fusing.  I might have another play with it and I can always use an iron to be sure of the seals to be sure.. 

The 'sauce'/tomato paste you can. The ph has to be acidic, it's rather important. You can't do it with the spaghetti itself in there nor meat.