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>>>How the heck to you have time to work too, DW?<<<

Hmmmmm, I remember when I used to work too... But have been retired for a few years. Now the work is called fun! Homeschooling, cooking, baking, gardening, chickens, fixin things, canning, drying,pickling, freezing, Tea Parties, getting prepared, sharing the bounty, and all that stuff.

>>>However, since you are my canning mentor, the fact that you use your freezer means I can never be completely free of my freezer dependence!<<<

I use the freezer as a convenience, not a necessity. When I am canning, and have small batches left over that are not enough for a canner full, I often just freeze it (also when it is getting really late and I have more canning to do than I really want to do). Plus some things just are better frozen - broccoli, cauliflower, summer squash, steaks, hamburger, roasts, whole turkeys and chickens.

Every summer, I try to go through the freezer and can or dry what has accumulated over the last year. That way, I don’t have freezer-burnt stuff from 1959.

By using the freezer often, I was fortunate enough to catch the failure within a few hours, and the mass (such as the gallons and gallons of goat milk surplus that I had frozen years ago and feed to the chickens) helped diminish the thawing rate.

I have put the broccoli and cauliflower and all of the vegetables in the spare refrigerators freezer and some in our regular refrigerator freezer, along with meat cuts that we wanted whole. VERY fortunately, I had the equipment and time to can and dry everything else along with keeping up with ripening crops in the garden. Yes, I was busy as a one-armed-paperhanger for a bit - 3 dehydrators running full tilt, pressure canner steaming away, a 24 qt. pot of tomato sauce cooking, and on the kerosene stove on the porch, I had the water bath canner boilin away with more sauce, while I was cutting up more meat for the canner - 19 pints at a time. (Love the bigger pressure canner - justified the extra cost in time/food saved)

Worked out very well. NOTHING LOST.

Now I can pull the freezer out and get to the back and side to check out what failed. (no way could I move it when it was full!)