Posted on 08/13/2005 8:34:10 PM PDT by GYPSY286
I've worked for "someone else" for the past 30 years and am still not rich! So I'm seriously considering working for myself (or win the lottery, whichever comes first). My family and friends have raved about my homemade spaghetti sauce and over the past several years many have strongly recommended that I find a way to market it.<> I did some preliminary research on canning and discovered that the process for canning tomatoes is different from the process of canning meats. (My sauce contains beef, pork, sausage and mushrooms.) Is anyone familiar with canning sauces who could give me some instruction? Thanks a million!
No clue. But I wish you good luck. I admire anyone with the courage to strike out on their own.
THank you
I would do the boiling bath method. How much do you know about canning?
You would need to contact the FDA to find out what their rules are before continuing one step further.
AFAIK (it's been YEARS since we've done any canning), if you want to preserve the meat of the tomatoes (i.e. stewed tomatoes) then they're done differently than meats (or any cooked product). But if the sauce is complete, as long it has attained a high-enough temperature to sterilize it then immediately sealing it should present no problems.
I would probably cook it in the jars and drop the lids on them while still piping hot (so they'll suck-in) - we used to do stuff in a big pressure cooker: bottles and all inside with the lids applied immediately after opening the pot.
The bottles will take the temperature with no problems - we used to 'cook' the bottles empty first to sterilize them, open the pot, add the ingredients (after they cooled a while so as not to shock them), sealed the pot and cooked the contents, vented it, opened it, and applied the lids immediately so they could cool and suck-down.
Only what I've researched on the Internet and reading about the two methods in one of my cookbooks.
I heard that anything with meats had to be canned in a pressure canner. I'm scared of pressure canners. But, I did can 9 quarts of tomatoes in a water bath canner today.
Commercial canning is nothing like home canning. The equipment cost can be staggering, especially for a meat product, which must be USDA inspected.
I would suggest you find a contract canner. Unfortunately, I do not know of any who will do a meat sauce.
If your sauce contains meat, you will have to pressure cook it for canning purposes.
If you plan to sell it, you will need to do this in a commercially licensed kitchen.
Start googling your state's regulations, probably adminstered by the health dept.
In the old days...tomatoes and sauce was considered acidic enough to only need a water bath.
But with the new breeds of tomatoes...traditonal canning methods are needed because of the lower acidity.
If you are selling the product, you are catapaulted into another catagory...and you might need to hire a professional to increase the recipe...to larger sizes and have a factory kitchen make up the product. Since this is a perishable product have your sales done up front before production.
I am no expert at canning. But, I just want to wish you good luck! Hope it works out for you!
Really!
I was canning my own sauces here in the store last year. One day, my USDA rep showed up for an inspection and shut down the canning.
She gave me a bunch of forms to fill out and the address of the the individual at the UVA medical center. I have to send a sample of the canned product to them. They analyze it and provide me with the information needed for the contents label. You MUST have a contents label.
It also has to be done in a commercial, USDA inspected kitchen with all USDA inspected/approved ingredients.
I was doing a Sauce Marinara, Sauce Carne', Sauce Bolognese, and Sauce Carbonara.
It's not something you can do at home.
On an up note, it was flying off the shelves at $4.95 a quart.
Last year, my daughter told me about an Oprah show where her guests were women who had started their own businesses. One of the guests made some dish which her friends and family raved about. She ended up selling her recipe to some major food conglomerate for $1M. Wish I could take that route!
I'm going to fill out the paperwork and go through the testing process and restart canning. I also want to do my chili and my Gazpacho.
The private label stuff works once the word gets around and you have a customer base.
I'd sell my recipes for $1M any day...
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