has anyone tried this canning butter recipe?

[mistylady]

Canned Butter

Oct7@aol.com says: This is where Low-fat butter and Non-fat butter just don't measure up. Only real butter will can and store without separating into chemicals and water.

 

Ingredients and Instructions

1. Use only highest quality butter (Land O Lakes or equivalent).

2. Heat jelly jars in 250 F.-degree oven for 20 minutes, without rings or seals.

3. While jars heat, melt butter slowly until it comes to a boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer for 5 minutes.

4. Pour melted butter carefully into heated jars, being careful not to get any butter on rim of jar.

5. Add lid and ring and close securely. They will seal as they cool. Shake jars a few times during cooling to prevent separation, although this step is optional.

6. Put into refrigerator or other cool place until butter hardens. After hardening, butter will store for 3 years.

 

[quiltys41]

Haven't tried it, but looks easy enough. I would be interest to know if it works too. Sometimes Kroger has their butter on sale, but I just throw that in the freezer. Might be worth a try.

 

Q

[ArmyOfFive4God]

I've read a LOT of sites that have done this with both marg & butter. End times report (.com?) hass a pictorial for doing both!

[Skagitgal]

Basically.it's a no no.

 

However, I have done it...do not suggest anyone else do it.

 

Ghee,[concentrated butter] is easier stored, makes a better end product, when canned.

 

I can't find the link, or would post it.

 

Dairy is not a 'good thing' to can. Commercial dried is better.

[Cat]

Canning BUTTER????

 

 

That's a BIG no-no here. Why try something so risky when there are perfectly good substitutes or commercially canned items?

 

 

That said, ghee has been tried, and is supposed to be ok. Try Googling "ghee" and see what it says.

 

 

 

[MizNCO]

Check out the responses to this link. We haven't tried this method because of the increased botulism risk.

 

http://www.warrifles.com/forums/showthread.php?t=34520

[Leah]

MizNCO,

you need to be a member and logged in to read that link...

[green5acres]

I did this last year when I got a great deal on butter, and just opened one last week it was really good! and easy to do I will be doing some more soon. The hardest part was the shaking the jars every few mins. DEE

[Violet]

I work at my local county extension office. We do not recommend sealing butter or margarine in a jar, it can lead to botulism. From National Center for Home Food Preservation :

Should I use directions for canning butter at home that I see on the Internet?

Indeed, there are some directions for 'canning' butter in circulation on the Internet. Most of what we have seen are not really canning, as they do not have Boiling Water or Pressure Canning processes applied to the filled jar. Jars are preheated, the butter is melted down and poured into the jars, and the lids are put on the jars. Some directions say to put the jars in the refrigerator as they re-harden, but to keep shaking them at regular intervals to keep the separating butter better mixed as it hardens. This is merely storing butter in canning jars, not ‘canning’. True home canning is when the food is heated enough to destroy or sufficiently acid enough to prevent growth of all spores of Clostridium botulinum (that causes botulism) and other pathogens during room temperature storage on the shelf.

 

Additionally, when you consider the economics of the process (energy costs involved with heating, cost of jars and lids, etc.), even if the butter is bought on sale, it may not be economically viable to prepare butter to store for years in this manner. Good quality butter is readily available at all times, if butter is needed for fresh use. If the concern is about emergency food supplies, there are dry forms of butter that can be purchased and stored, oils that can be used in an emergency, or commercially canned butter in tins (although we have only seen this for sale from other countries). Melted and re-hardened butter may not function the same as original butter in many types of baking anyway.

 

There are a few issues with the common directions circulating on the Internet at this time (Spring 2006):

 

Physical safety and food quality: In the provided directions, the jars are preheated in an oven (dry-heat), which is not recommended for canning jars. Manufacturers of canning jars do not recommend baking or oven canning in the jars. It is very risky with regard to causing jar breakage. There is no guarantee that the jars heated in this dry manner are sufficiently heated to sterilize them, as we do not have data on sterilizing jar surfaces by this dry-heating method.

The butter is not really being 'canned'; it is simply being melted and put in canning jars, and covered with lids. Due to some heat present from the hot melted butters and preheated jars, some degree of vacuum is pulled on the lids to develop a seal. It rarely is as strong a vacuum as you obtain in jars sealed through heat processing. The practice in these 'canned' butter directions is referred to as 'open-kettle' canning in our terminology, which is really no canning at all, since the jar (with product in it) is not being heat processed before storage.

Although mostly fat, butter is a low-acid food. Meat, vegetables, butter, cream, etc. are low-acid products that will support the outgrowth of C. botulinum and toxin formation in a sealed jar at room temperature. Low-acid products have to be pressure-canned by tested processes to be kept in a sealed jar at room temperature. It is not clear what the botulism risk is from such a high-fat product, but to store a low-acid moist food in a sealed jar at room temperature requires processing to destroy spores. A normal salted butter has about 16-17% water, some salt, protein, vitamins and minerals. Some butter-like spreads have varying amounts of water in them. We have no kind of database in the home canning/food processing arena to know what the microbiological concerns would be in a butter stored at room temperature in a sealed jar. In the absence of that, given that it is low-acid and that fats can protect spores from heat if they are in the product during a canning process, we cannot recommend storing butter produced by these methods under vacuum sealed conditions at room temperature.

Some other directions do call for 'canning' the filled jars of butter in a dry oven. This also is not 'canning'. There is not sufficient, research-based documentation to support that 'canning' any food in a dry oven as described on this web page or any page that proposes oven canning is even sufficient heating to destroy bacteria of concern, let alone enough to produce a proper seal with today's home canning lids.

 

In conclusion, with no testing having been conducted to validate these methods, we would NOT recommend or endorse them as a safe home-canning process, let alone for storing butter at room temperature for an extended period. We do know that the methods given for preheating empty jars, or even filled jars, in a dry oven are not recommended by the jar manufacturers or by us for any food. Aside from the physical safety and quality issues, and the fact that it is not canning at all, if there happened to be spores of certain bacteria in there, these procedures will not destroy those spores for safe room temperature storage.

 

 

 

[Cat]

THANK YOU, Violet!!!

 

 

Listen to her, friends... she knows what she's talking about!

 

 

It's NOT WORTH THE RISK!

 

 

 

We want you around for a looooooong time!

 

 

[Darlene]

Yes, as Cat and Violet have stated, At MrsSurvival we do not condone the practice of home canned butter, or any dairy product for that matter.

 

Everyone has to make their own decisions and choices as to what they're willing to risk, but I just wanted to reiterate the stance we have here, for the detailed reasons Violet posted above.