Cleaning and Sterilising jars.

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Clouston

Member
Jan 11, 2010
19
0
East Lancashire
No, No, No, sorry to have to say this but a Kilner jar and a Ball jar are two completely different jars.

John Kilner (1792-1857) invented the Kilner jar along with his associates. He later founded the John Kilner & Co glass company in 1842 that produced this jar. Although enjoying commercial success, rival glass manufacturers were quick to create alternatives - and the Kilner family business (by then called Kilner Brothers Ltd) went bankrupt in 1937. The patents and trademarks of the Kilner Jar were sold to the United Glass Bottle Company in the same year, where more modern Kilner jars are still being produced today. John Kilner was the great-great-great-great Grandfather of famous motoring journalist, Jeremy Clarkson.


A Mason jar is a glass jar used in canning to preserve food. They were invented and patented by John L. Mason in 1858. They are also called Ball jars, after Ball Corp., a popular and early manufacturer of the jars; fruit jars because they are often used to store fruit; or generically glass canning jars. While largely supplanted by other methods for commercial mass-production, they are still commonly used in home canning.
In modern usage, the terms often refer specifically to jars featuring a two-piece cover: An inner, flat, metal or glass lid, covered by a screw-on ring. The ring holds the lid in place during the canning process, which creates a partial vacuum, sealing the lid until opened. The lids are sold separately so that the jars and rings can be reused.
Mason jars are made of soda-lime glass, and come in a variety of sizes including pint, quart, half-gallon, and cup sizes, as well as in wide-mouth and regular mouth shapes.
The most common US brands of Mason jars are Ball and Kerr, both brand names now part of the Jarden corporation.
 

gregorach

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Sep 15, 2005
3,723
28
50
Edinburgh
Cheers for the Lakeland links BR - I've been looking for somewhere decent to buy more Kilners... Jolly handy canning set too - no more faffing about with pulling hot jars out of the oven with tea towels for me! :)
 

Chinkapin

Settler
Jan 5, 2009
746
1
83
Kansas USA
Clouston:
Yes, they are two completely completely different jars. I never meant to say or imply that they were the exact same. So please forgive me if I left that impression. However, if you look at the picture of the Kilner jar provided by BR, you will note that it even has the same two piece lid arrangement as the Mason, Kerr, etc. I would imagine that the dimensions are a bit different and that the screw thread is probably different as well. But, for all practical purposes, they are essentially the same thing. If I were canning something tomorrow, I wouldn't care in the slightest whether I had a Kilner, or a Kerr. Either or both would be satisfactory.

BR and Toddy: I was telling my wife about our little home "canning" conversation, and she remembered something that you may find interesting. She said that her grandmother (who lived on a small farm in Arkansas) used to, in the morning, cook a large portion of sausage (in patties) and after she had it all cooked she would place it into a small ceramic crock and layer it until the crock was nearly full. Then, she would pour hot melted grease (hog fat) over it until it was completely covered. The next time she needed sausage for breakfast she would just dig down and take out what she needed.

Her grandmother said when she was a girl and there was no refrigeration, they would kill a hog, grind up the sausage they wanted and preserve the entire amount in this manner and it would last until it was necessary to kill another hog.

I expect the same technique was used in the U.K. but even if it was, is probably not well known today (just guessing), so I thought I would pass this on. I've seen my mother do the same thing but she never kept it more than a couple of days and stored it in the fridge.
 

Gavmar

Life Member
Jan 24, 2010
413
0
Dagenham Essex
If you want to be 100% sure buy a cheap pressure cooker as our mycoligist friend points out. leave the jars jar in the pressure cooker till you are ready to use them. I've sterilised 10's of thousands of jars using this method and have had maybe 3% contaminate.
 

British Red

M.A.B (Mad About Bushcraft)
Dec 30, 2005
26,709
1,947
Mercia
Chinkapin,

Fat is certainly a good preservative...its use in pemmican can testify to that! Indeed I have some home canned butter (not pressure caned) that is over two years old and has never been refrigerated. Cheese works the same way.

There are many of these techniques that really work - freezing, drying, acid, sugar, salt, heat etc. I keep meaning to do another "science of" article (like the science of water one) on preservation techniques, but for this forum I guess its more than a bit "off topic"

Red
 

British Red

M.A.B (Mad About Bushcraft)
Dec 30, 2005
26,709
1,947
Mercia
Cheers for the Lakeland links BR - I've been looking for somewhere decent to buy more Kilners... Jolly handy canning set too - no more faffing about with pulling hot jars out of the oven with tea towels for me! :)

The canning set is excellent. Do you pressure can Dunc or water bath?
 

Chinkapin

Settler
Jan 5, 2009
746
1
83
Kansas USA
You really should do that article BR, I think there is probably quite a bit of overlap between "home canners" and "bushcraft" people. I'll bet it would have many, many hits.
 

gregorach

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Sep 15, 2005
3,723
28
50
Edinburgh
The canning set is excellent. Do you pressure can Dunc or water bath?

In the past I've done the non-USDA-approved oven canning method (and managed not to kill myself), but I think water bath is the way forward for now - I already have the 30L brewing boiler which will do the job, and I don't have the space for yet more kit... I just need to find a suitable rack to put in it.

As for preserving in fat, I've got a lovely jar of duck confit in the fridge... Must get around to using that up! ;)
 

British Red

M.A.B (Mad About Bushcraft)
Dec 30, 2005
26,709
1,947
Mercia
I sense pressure canning would fascinate some members here (given its rarely if ever done in the UK)

I'll do a basic pictorial in September when I get canning and see if theres interest in more

Red
 

Nagual

Native
Jun 5, 2007
1,963
0
Argyll
I sense pressure canning would fascinate some members here (given its rarely if ever done in the UK)

I'll do a basic pictorial in September when I get canning and see if theres interest in more

Red

I suspect that you'll not need to see if the interest is there BR, your guides are interesting to even those without an interest.. :) and to those of us interested, we are fascinated.. :D
 

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