The Canning Chronicles continue with an easy but flavorful pantry staple with a twist: Peppered Bacon Green Beans. I now, right?! They remind me of my childhood and the various things I specifically remember my Gramma making. This is one of them. Seeing them on the shelves. smelling them as they heat up and gobbling them down are all nostalgic memories that I am more than appreciative that I can recreate for myself as well as the next generation that get to experience the very same things. I hope that the ladies of this family will always continue the canning tradition. Just the thought makes my heart sing…
This simple recipe is a great addition to your pantry shelves. It only has two ingredients: peppered thick cut bacon and fresh green beans. And by fresh, I mean not from a can. This recipe is perfect for beans from the garden. I do not have the space I would like to grow the amount of beans I want each season, so I do the next best thing and purchase mine from a local farm in bulk and then freeze them until I’m ready to use them. Because I live in a Right to Farm community, I am blessed with a plethora of farms local to me that I source my produce, milk, meat, eggs and specialty items from. I’m waiting on a Spring delivery of new chicks. My older gals have stopped laying and now just enjoy a pretty good life. I only have a small garden area, so I depend on local farmers as well as trips to the grocery store to sustain my family throughout the year.
There are certain staples that I always keep on my shelves and green beans are one of them. I like to can them in plain water, that way they are versatile and can be used in a multitude of recipes regardless of the flavor profile you want to create. But… I also like to keep the unexpected on my shelves as well. Things that have an unexpected flavor profile, or one so intense it should be illegal, those are the types of flavors I like to preserve. Not only do they impress me with their bougie flavor, but they’ll impress guests that may show up unexpectedly. Keeping elevated items on the shelves is a must in my household, and by adding bacon to green beans, this simple recipe also becomes an elevated flavor you probably aren’t expecting from a jar. Because bacon is such a go-with-everything flavor I do find that canning beans this way does not limit them to only heating them up and enjoying them. They can also be used in various recipes that cohesively go with the bacon flavor profile infused into these beans. Now that I have your attention in the matter, let me get right onto this simple canning recipe. I have created it in a printable version so you can add it to your canning recipe book with ease. I also have a video of this process on my channel for Canuary 2023 if you’d like to watch it.
[recipe title= "Canning Peppered Bacon Green Beans" Servings= "Approx. 5 qts or 10 pints" difficulty= "Easy / Beginner"]
Ingredients:
- 2 lbs. Peppered Bacon, Thick Cut
- 10 lbs. Green Beans
Recipe:
Prepare your canning jars by inspecting the jars, lids and rings for any imperfections. Discard any with blemishes, rust, chips or cracks. Wash them all in hot soapy water and rinse. Fill each jar with hot water leaving the water in the jars until you are ready to use them. This keeps the jars nice and hot and prevents thermal breakage when you add hot ingredients.
Cut up the bacon into 1″ pieces. I find that using kitchen shears is a game changer to accomplish this task. Once the bacon is cut up, fry it until it completely golden and crispy. I do not leave any raw or undercooked. Every piece is slowly fried up to a golden crisp and then removed and placed on paper towel to sit and drain. I also use paper towel on the bacon pieces tapping and moving them around to remove the most amount of grease possible. Leave to cool and then dice it up into small pieces, like bacon bits.
Remove the stems and end tips of the beans. Chop them into 2″ pieces, discarding any blemished or browned beans. Never can imperfect vegetables. Next put them in a large pot and cover with water. Bring to a low rolling boil for 5 minutes. Give the beans a few good stirs during that time to keep the heat regulated and all then beans evenly cooked. Remove from the heat when done but DO NOT drain the water. We’ll be using it in the jars.
Dump the water out of the canning jars and add 1 tbsp. of bacon to the bottom of each jar. Using a spider skimmer remove the beans from the pot and put them into your jars using a jar funnel Fill the jars to a 1″ headspace tapping down gently and then ladle in the hot water the beans were cooked in keeping the headspace at 1″. Debubble the jars thoroughly and adjust any jars with more liquid if needed to maintain the 1″ headspace. Next, add 1 tbsp of chopped bacon to the top of the beans in each jar. Clean the rims and sides with white vinegar. Apply the lids and the rings making the rings finger tight Dump any leftover vinegar into your heated pressure canner.
Add jars to a preheated pressure canner. Secure the lid and let the canner vent and come to pressure achieving your specific canning PSI level. If you are unsure, Google can give you the required PSI for your elevation. Process quart jars for 25 minutes and pints for 20 minutes.
Remove the rings when safe to handle and leave the jars undisturbed overnight. Check the seals in the morning. Failed seals must be refrigerated and used or you could try processing them again. Label your jars and journal your canning experience for future reference. Include the recipe, results and any notes you want to remember. I do this for successes and for failures and have found it to be completely helpful and resourceful throughout the years.
Note: You could add 1 tsp of minced onion to the quart jars or 1/2 tsp to the pint jars if you’d like. The flavor goes nicely with the beans and the bacon. I bet you could add 5-6 scallion slices to the tops instead before sealing and get the same results without an overpowered flavor. I’ll have to try that next!!
*This recipe is not USDA approved. it’s what you some call rebel canning. But I can say that this recipe has been a tried-and-true recipe on my shelves for a long time and I’ve never had an issue. The concept of this recipe was adapted from the Canning Diva herself: Diane Devereaux and is in fact one I know to be successful. Only you can decide if you want to can this up for your pantry inventory. I’m just sharing that I do, and my family loves it.
[/recipe]
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