New Water Bath Canner

Anybody but me sick of canning, freezing, and drying food for the winter? I can't be alone in this feeling. I know I shouldn't complain about all this wonderful food stacked in the basement but I'm about to stick permanently to my kitchen floor and the bathrooms haven't seen a cleaning since before Labor Day.

Mornings I spend at the corrals working, often on our new to us, tractor, (Oh how I love that thing!) afternoons, evenings, and often in to the night I'm fighting to stay awake in the kitchen canning.

The most exciting thing is a new piece of equipment I bought last winter to replace one of my blue enamel water bath kettles. It is stainless steel and so despite my efforts all the pictures turned out lousy because of the shine. So just imagine the old enamel kettle all shiny but with a dial on the lid. The dial is the exciting part. This dial tells you when those jars of food you just put in are ready to be timed. It is according to your altitude. We are at 5000 feet and so we fit into the orange section.

When the water and contents of the jars in the water bath reach the correct temperature, which for us is when the red dial goes up to the green line, then for pears I set the timer for twenty minutes for pints. No more guessing if the water is bubbling enough. This is a must buy if you are a serious canner. Meaning if you like me  have boxes and boxes of food to process. I've left you a link encase you want to read more on this new gadget.
http://victoriokitchenproducts.com/product.php?id=67

Next week I should be pretty much done and I can put my garden to bed, starting on a cazillion other projects waiting for my attention. Isn't that the way of it when you are working on being as self-sufficient as possible.