TO DO LIST - Canning Chili

My husband recently bought me a beautiful canner, the All-American Pressure Cooker and Canner.  It's biggest selling point to us, was the metal-to-metal seal, with no gaskets, and it's built like a tank.  If this thing falls off my pantry shelf and hits me in the head, I know the canner will win.

Tomorrow I will be canning some chili meat.  Since I prefer using canned beans anyways, I will have cans of chili beans to go with each of my quart jars of Chili Meat.

My typical chili recipe is....

1 lb ground beef, browned
1 diced onion
1 pint jar diced tomatoes
2 cans chili beans
3-4 tbsp of chili seasoning

And I serve this with rice and shredded cheddar cheese and sour cream (if these things are available).  It is delicious.

As for chili beans, I have tried many kinds, black beans, red beans, small kidney beans, large kidney beans, and pinto beans.  I prefer the black beans so far, and they seem to have a higher protein count and lower carbohydrate count also.

Sometimes I mix my own chili seasoning, using cumin, chili powder, garlic, salt, and pepper.  I really prefer mixing my own, but since I haven't organized my spice shelf recently, I have trouble finding the little store bag with chili powder, or cumin, and sometimes, can't remember if I used the last of the garlic powder, when I am at the store.  So I DO have a stash of bulk "chili seasoning" from the grocery store as well.

This will be a test run.  I have 4 lbs of frozen ground beef.  So I will prepare that, with 4 onions, 4 cans of tomatoes, and enough chili seasoning to compensate for the eventual addition of beans.  I am debating on using pints or quarts to can it, so that it will be most equivalent to the quantity we are used to enjoying.

Regardless, I'm looking forward to using my new canner, and if all goes well, I will post picks of my accomplishments tomorrow evening!