Canning help - warped lids.
 

I need some guidance on canning

We were doing tomato sauce and pickled peppers using wide-mouth quart size mason jars (from the company Ball) and we're noticing a significant portion of the jars while cooking in the boiling water for sealing developed warping in their lids. This was especially true for the jars of pickled peppers.

What causes the lids to deform like that and how to prevent it?

I believe some of these jars with warped lids may have their seals compromised due to the distortion - would you agree? How to determine ?

Thanks

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

Define "warped lid" ......with the sealing ring on it, about the only way the lid can go is too crown up in the center.....is that what you mean ?

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

yes, the lid portion (flat disc with rubber seal) is dented upwards as if someone took a sharp flat object and struck it upwards from within the jar. The tightening ring seems to be ok but I am worried the dented portion is where the rubber seal is no longer firmly pressed against the glass lip.

I can try to post some photos later today if I am not describing it well enough

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

Morning DS, we do a lot of canning here, and have never experienced "warped" lids. how to check the seal..take you thumb or forefinger and press firmly down on the center of the lids, if it snaps back or has play then yes the seal is probably compromised. the lid should be slightly sunken in the center of the lid if sealed properly.

Also, dont know if this would have any bearing on the warping or not, but how tight are you adjusting the bands before processing? we do ours finger tight just to feel resistance, then a "scotch" more.

1 more thing..are you waterbathing or pressure canning?

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

Good morning Shorty thanks for your reply

We are waterbathing them for about 15 minutes in rolling boiling water.

I tighten them by hand so they are good and tight. I dont use any tools or gloves or anything to tighten it beyond what I can with my bare hands - and I do not try to go overboard tightening them as hard as possible.

Also some of them were tightened by my mother who cannot tighten it much.

Regardless of who tightened it though, we have warping in both batches.

Yeah some of the jars then are definitely not sealed properly. When they came out of the waterbath I was pressing on the top of the lid and it did indeed have play.

Damn why did it happen? Lots of lost labor here then

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

Huh..strange..never had warped lids before. maybe a bad batch of lids? dunno.

well on the up side you should be able to re-process the jars (Andy should know for sure) and all of your hard work should be able to be spared and saved.

I will see if i can look through some of my books to see if i can find out why they warped....wait did you say that the lids we actually convex in the center, and NOT concave? is that what you meant (domed and not sunken in the center?)

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

well it sounds to me that you might of slightly over tighten the lids/rings a little bit on some of them. that would cause em to build up pressure and dome the lids instead of releasing pressure and creating a vacuum.

You should be able to save the batch by just reprocessing them.

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

Never had that happen either. You can reprocess as long as you held the jars in a safe condition ( like in the fridge ).

What brand of lids were you using ?

A photo would be nice too, if you can.

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

I think the warped lids are from over filling the jars.

I Just started canning a couple weeks ago so I don't have a lot of experience, but this happened to me on my second batch. I was pressure canning some beef stew and 5 of the 7 jars had extremely deformed lids. While they were still hot I pushed the lids down and after cooling they seemed to have sealed OK ...even with creases. Nevertheless I put those jars in the refrigerator and we have been eating beef stew every night. When comparing the jars I noticed the jars with the deformed lids had stew nearly to the top while the 2 good jars had stew an inch or less from the lid.

Because the deformed lid situation bothered me I tried again last night, from the same batch of jars, being careful not to over fill and every one came out straight.

If someone with more experience has a better explanation I would sure like to know too....I am tired of beef stew:-)

edit: The other option may be packing too tightly. I compacted the beef chunks in the first batch and lightly dropped the beef chunks in the second batch.

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

MrsTnAndy agrees with your theory, 30pcs......overfilling, not leaving 1" or so of head space.

If you screw the rings down TOO tight, the lid can't "lift" off and let a little run down the sides ( which it will do if you overfill ), so I guess the lid has to give by denting.....

By the way, you could simply reprocess those jars by taking out a small amount, use a new lid and run them again in the canner. What you might find, though, is things like the potatoes/carrots/etc will turn to mush on a second run from cooking that long.....takes 90 minutes on quarts with any type of meat in them, and veggies can't take 180 minutes and stay firm. Probably better to pull out of the jars and put in freezer containers or seal-a-meal boil bags and freeze.

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

Thanks for your help guys!

It turns out that now after cooling for a long period of time I am checking those same jars and the distortion is much less pronounced and they dont have nearly as much play- if any- anymore! So I guess I probably did fill a bit too much or maybe left too many air pockets inside the jar and so it needed to cool down a lot. The lids are still a little dented but not nearly what they looked like when we first took them out, and I feel much safer about the seals now.

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

I agree, all canning instructions I have seen, including the Ball Blue book, say to leave 1 inch of air space at the top before processing.

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

You should hear them pop as they cool, another indication of a good seal although not perfect indicator, pressing the lid and verifying there is no play is the best indicator I think. Good luck.

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

That's correct....you will hear them pop as the cool off, sometimes it takes hours. But by the next day, if you push down in the center of the lid, and it gives ANY, then you most likely have an unsealed jar....eat or re-process or freeze contents.

Another thing to watch for is food on the jar rims as you fill......MrsTnAndy is always careful to wipe the edges of the jars before I slap the lid on.....me, I'm not so picky :D.

Also, we boil the lids/rings to sterilize them, pull them directly out of hot water and onto the food filled jar, then into the canner. I assume you are doing this ? My neighbor told me the other night they run them thru the dishwasher to 'sterilize'.....I wouldn't think that would do the trick.....

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

All good tips Guys (& Gal)..I follow the same guidelines myself as I am quite "anal" about the success of my canning LOL...never had a seal fail yet **crosses fingers and knocks on wood**

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

We have a very low failure rate.....less than 1/100. Did 50 quarts of apples and 29 pints of pears this weekend, one "no seal" quart. She is making a pie as I type...all is NOT lost.... :D

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

Oh man that looks good. Would MrsTnAndy share your apples canning recipee? Is it ready for the pie right our of the jar (spices added during canning?)? You a lucky man Tn...

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

Yep, make pie shell, pour contents of jar in shell, put top crust on, and bake.

Canned Apples:

Peel fresh apples, core, slice....we soak in "fruit fresh" ( powdered ascorbic acid ) to keep from turning brown before canning.

Make up a syrup of 10 cups water to 4 1/2 cups sugar, 1 cup corn starch (mix starch in one of the 10 cups of water, then add to the rest ), 2 teaspoons of cinnamon. Bring syrup to a boil to thicken ( but watch it doesn't thicken TOO much ), stir constantly to keep from sticking.

Put 1/2 jar of apples, add some syrup, then put the rest of the apples in the jar, and top off with syrup. Water bath 20 minutes.

By the way, we use a mechanical peeler......and I poo-pah'ed it when she bought it, but it FLAT WORKS......peels, cores and slices in one operation....much faster than by hand if you have a lot to do.

http://www.pamperedchef.com/graphics...0/2430_200.jpg

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

thanks to both. next GIM fest hope to see one of those:wink: as long as it is not a frozen door stop, err hockey puck, which it would have been at the last get together:wink:

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

Don't mess with the seals when the jars are hot. After about 12 hours you can tap the tops of the jars with a spoon or fingernail. Unsealed jars sound different. Put unsealed jars in fridge to eat or recan. Remove rings from jar. Do not store with the rings on, they don't have anything to do with the seal of the jar.

I used to take the jars out of the canner immediately when the time was up and I was having quite a few seal failures because I was getting a lot of juice spurting out of the jar and then it wouldn't seal. Now I let the jars sit in the canner about 5-10 minutes before removing them and I don't have as many seal failures.

Another thing that can affect sealing is if there is a nick in the top of the jar. Run your finger around every jar rim before filling the jar to check for nicks.

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

While we're on canning details, one thing we found was absolutely necessary was boiling the lids to soften the rubber. You would think this was a nicety or just sterilization but it has a noticeable impact on the % sealed.

Head space is critical, as if it's too high (tempting for that last jar) it won't pull the seal back down, and too little leaves enough O2 that it could spoil. That goes for poking meats and questionables to get air bubbles out.

Isn't the proper bath time about 40 min, not 15?

TS

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

At least double that time for tomatoes!, leave an inch of space, don't overtighten rings, use boiling water or as I do very hot tap water with a bleach kicker[just a teaspoon or so]for five minutes to sterilize jars lids and rings, clean the jar edge very carefully and check for any tiny nicks, ALWAYS cook anything with potatoes in it as long and as well as you cook meats[or pre-cook the potatoes].

Re: Canning help - warped lids.
 

I'm doing less canning than in the past, preferring fresh and raw foods rather than heavily cooked.

Whatever.

Here is how I made beef stew before.

I prepare the stew in a couple of large stainless kettles (about 16 quarts each) and it is boiling before I put it in the jars. I use an electric range and an outdoor style propane cache cooker. This unit has two large burners and will bring pressure cookers up to pressure in just a few minutes. The quart jars go in the pressure cookers with the lids upside down and the pressure cooker lid on but not locked.

When the stew is about 3/4 done cooking, I start pouring the stew into the jars which are also at a boiling temperature. About a half inch clear at the top of the jar. The full jars go right back into the pressure cooker with the rings just snug - not tight. I use welder's gloves to handle all this stuff.

Don't need to cook in the pressure cooker very long. The recipes call for something like 45 minutes, but I just bring the pressure up, hold it there five to ten minutes and shut the heat off. Because the contents were already boiling when placed into the boiling hot jars, everything is already sterile. When the pressure drops to zero, I pull the jars and set them aside.

Since I have three pressure cookers, I can get this into a continuous rotation.

I have had some problems with the red rubber seals put out by Ball several years ago. The Kerr rubber is harder and has not caused problems. The Ball seal rubber would creep when hot and under the pressures involved. The creeping looked like it inward from the vacuum pressure until the seal failed. This was happening within 15 minutes after the jars came out of the pressure cooker, so I could dump back into the batch.

But yes, overcooking causes mushiness.

This year, I am mostly making fruit preserves as jam. Made raspberry jam and apricot jam and will be doing plums soon.

If I poach a whitetail, maybe will can some meat unless I make sausage...

Carver