Gave Our Canned Butter A Try Today:

If you guys remember back in March, Deb and I tried our hands at canning butter. We canned 12 pints to see how it turned out, to see if it had good taste after being canned, and how the butter keeps on a shelf in the pantry.

Well, it’s been almost six months now, and we decided today to take a pint out, and see how it’s doing. On a scale of one to ten, I’d have to give it a fourteen. Basically it scores so high because I made it…and I scored it! You see, it ain’t what you know…it’s WHO you know!

Actually though, I am very impressed. It seems to store very well, the color and texture are holding up fine (it is really pretty canned in the jars), and I and Deb both thought the taste was very good. I promise you all, we’ll be canning more of this.

One reason we decided to try canning butter was the ability to keep butter on hand that didn’t have the need for refrigeration. This plus the fact butter takes up freezer space that could be used for other things…mainly meat and vegetables.

We see now that without a doubt, you can put butter up in this way, and the taste is just fine. Hey Mississippi…got you a picture of spreading it on toast like you requested…except you requested on a biscuit, but we forgot and used toast! Sorry…

Power goes out…no problem, because your butter is sitting on a shelf…at room temperature. Deb and I both feel that the more ways you can utilize storage that can get by with no electricity, the better off we are.

Some people prefer freezing versus canning, and honestly I’m not sure there is such a thing as one really being better than the other. Although we feel canning is more our way of putting up our food supplies, at least as much as we can anyway.

Once again, we feel this way mainly from a “no power” standpoint, plus we enjoy the taste of canned food. In all actuality, if we were without power for any extended period of time, then we’d probably can most of the meat we’d have in our freezer anyway. It ends up being your own personal preference.

The butter as an example, is a product many people say you cannot can safely. BUT, if you don’t make sure that what you’re canning isn’t done properly, ANYTHING can spoil, or go bad.

Some reasons why, may be jars not sealing, not wiping lids free of film while filling jars, not canned at the proper pressure, or not cooked long enough. These are but a few examples. So, the most important thing in canning is simply doing it right, the first time.

Now corn, Deb and I don’t can this. We cream our corn from the garden and freeze it. This is probably the one vegetable we do freeze, plus it takes a long time to can, and cream corn is our preferred style of eating it, unless right off the cob.

Any corn storage to speak of that we have is regular store bought corn, but we have just about any vegetable under the sun that’s store bought and stored as well.

We’ve canned stews, soups, beef, pork and chicken, fruits, and vegetables. We just made a chicken salad the other night. We used a pint jar of chicken we’d canned…in 2008! Delicious!

Also a buddy of ours took home some stew and some canned chicken. He called a few days later and said his wife made up a pot of rice and some cornbread, heated up the canned stew and served it over the rice. The chicken they made chicken salad as well, and he said both the stew and the chicken were great. Their dates…2008 as well.

The home canned products last very, very well, and again, Deb and I both are firm believers in canning. We also enjoy the time together we spend doing these things. To us, it is simply a part of our lifestyle, and keeps us in good, fresh, homegrown food products. Life is good…

Now, one thing do in regards to freezing, besides the normal things such as meat, is to cook some meals using the, what I like to call, “the overkill method!” This being just cooking more at one time that we could ever possibly eat. The remaining leftover food, we simply food saver and freeze for a later time.

This, just like canning is really a time saver for quick, easy, nutritious meals. Meatloaf, ham, stuffed peppers, barbequed chicken, lasagna, macaroni and cheese, chili, beans, etc. Take these jewels out at a later date, thaw, heat, and…it’s suppertime!

For heavy prep meals such as lasagna and stuffed peppers, this method works really well with. This being because with one prep time, one baking time, and one CLEANUP, you may enjoy meals that you really like, and having them possibly 3-4 more times off one cook. Again, with only one prep, bake, and cleanup. How easy is that?

So, as I said earlier, we were very, very pleased with how the butter turned out. Phew…I was sweatin this one out, as honestly, I wasn’t sure of the end result. Now, after almost 6 months, I can see clearly that this method of food storage WILL work, and work well!

Here’s our column on how we canned the butter, with pictures to boot!

Here’s a couple pictures of our butter after 6 months on a shelf in the pantry.

Our butter in the right hand corner, and four jars of honey the bee lady just brought for us.

Showing the butter

Fixing to slap some on a piece of toast

Look how well it spreads!


Blueberry preserves our good friend Wendy brought down for Deb and I. These aren’t shabby with toast and butter either! Actually Wendy’s preserves are excellent! Hey Wendy…we’re runnin’ low here, okay?


Thank you all so much for droppin’ back in to visit with us a while again today. God Bless each and every one of you guys! Deb says once more to keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!

Dub and Deb

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7 Responses to Gave Our Canned Butter A Try Today:

  1. Chris J says:

    Hi there, what kind of butter do you buy? Do you buy the blocks of Land O’Lakes type butter or the BIG kind sold at a Costco? Can you email a recipe? I am getting more into the canning. Mostly I am canning tomatoes and freezing beans and dehydrating tomatoes because I do not have a pressure cooker yet. I have made jerky in my dehydrator, but it never lasts long enough to store. LOL. I would like to try my hand at canning butter.

    Thanks for any and all ideas or help.

    • Ann says:

      Chris, my mother has been canning since she was a child. She said that this year, instead of using a pressure cooker, she decided to run her jars and lids through the dishwasher on the hottest setting. While they were super hot, she pulled them out filled them with her hot beet pickles, and put the lids on and they sealed like a dream. She said she doesn’t know if she’ll ever get the pressure cooker out again. You may want to give it a try since it’s really all about the seal.

      • Bill says:

        It’s NOT all about the seal, low acid foods must be heated to kill botulism spores and other bugs. Some foods, like pickles and jams, can be hot water canned due to the amount of acid or sugar, otherwise you need pressure canning or you’re risking sickness or death. Please be careful and believe that there’s a good reason for most of the things we do in canning, it’s not just for making more work.

  2. Sandra says:

    Could not wait for this one!
    Looks good, color and texture. Where’s that honey?
    How is the cow that gave up the butter? The butter’s shelf life
    will outlast the cow’s. HAMBURGER! You may can that too.
    You guys make my day every day. Keeps a smile in my heart.

  3. Pingback: Gave Our Canned Butter A Try Today - Cultured Butter

  4. AoC says:

    Now this is an interesting concept, but something I’d like to hear and see more of it.

  5. Jim says:

    Ann,

    Tell your Mom she must pressure cook non- or low- acid foods to kill the botulina spores. High acid foods can probably be canned in a water bath, but not beets (unless she adds a lot of vinegar and salt and turns them into beet “pickles”)

    The “seal” is important, but unless you kill the spores, they will happily reproduce in the low level of oxygen that is typical in canned foods. Result? Sickness and death.

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