Saturday, July 30, 2016

Vacuum sealing dry goods in jars with a pressure canner

I saw this idea posted over at SurvivalBlog a couple of weeks ago and thought it was pretty brilliant.

Since then I have ordered and received a brand new vacuum pump, one of those Food Saver adapters for Mason Jars and an adapter for the vacuum pump fitting. The vacuum pump is the kind you can buy to fix the air conditioning in your car with and I got a smoking deal on it from Amazon because I applied for their damn credit card and got 50 bucks off my order for it.


I also have had a pressure canner sitting in a box that I bought brand new a few years ago that I have never used.
I was bit disappointed when I finally opened it up and discovered the gauge and little rocker gizmo were missing but I'll be getting those coming here pretty quick now that I know that they weren't there for whatever reason.
I am going to get a little ball valve, a bulkhead type fitting for the hose I need to get and will put the fitting in the hole where the gauge was supposed to go.
I'll also throw a "tee" fitting inline and mount a vacuum gauge on that.
When It's all together, it should be a pretty first class set up for doing this.
Then I need the jars of course but since canning season is here that should be easy.
After that, It's keep an eye out for dry goods that go on sale and have at it.

I found this video on Youtube that shows how it works and also that you can do it cheap too.



One thing I noticed in this video is that the guy mentions doing this to his wine so it doesn't go bad. I would strongly recommend that you do this with dry goods only.
The reason for the ball valve is that while researching this, I found a guy who said that if you don't apply the vacuum gradually on powdery things like flour is that it will suck it up into the hose.

Not good, you definitely don't want that kind of thing getting into your pump and gumming it all up.

If anyone has any experience with this please let me know your thoughts in the comments, it would be nice to hear if there is anything else I should be aware of.


8 comments:

deb harvey said...

thanks. no heating the kitchen or oxygen absorbers or safety issues with commercial jars.
the commercial jars reused for this save so much money on supplies!

Moe said...

That's pretty cool.

Been a half-ass prepper/survivalist since Howard Ruff was pitching his RuffTimes; really hard to find any enthusiasm -- even for the good ideas -- these days.

later,
-Moe

Sixbears said...

Huh, another use for a pressure cooker, besides as the base for a good still.

Anonymous said...

over twenty years ago used the vacuum inlet to my car connected to a homemade vac chamber made from a shipping container

got 15 to 20 inches on the vac gauge

used a water cooler valve to rapidly break the vacuum and sealed shut mason jars of beans and lentils

every year open just to hear the pop noise a random jar

Wildflower

Anonymous said...

fine flour, use a gas filter to keep the powder out of the pump

do not vac gunpowder, ammo, or buthane lighters

Wildflower

B said...

second on the gas filter...


And you need a BIG valve to release the vacuum. It has to be done very rapidly to get the jars to seal.

Phil said...

Way ahead of the curve aincha?
That's pretty clever.

Anonymous said...

For a true grid down situation, a break bleeder will also work.

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