I'm going to teach you how to can beets today which will be a delight for those of you training for the Little House on the Prairie Olympics.
In September grocery stores start selling big bags of onions and beets for cheap.
I usually use the pillowcase sized bags of grocery store beets to make pickled beets every few years. This, however, is the first time I've ever canned plain old regular beets because - I used to be stupid.
Now I am enlightened and clever.
Table of Contents
Ingredients
Just a whack of store bought or garden grown beets.
- beets
That's your only ingredient. Just. Beets.
Instructions
You'll also need water and the all important pressure canner. Beets are a low acid food that have to be processed, and they have to be processed in a pressure canner, not a water bath.
- Step 1: Boil washed beets.
- Step 2: Remove the skins then quarter the beets.
- Step 3: Add to hot canning jars and fill to boiling water.
- Step 4: Clean rims before adding sealers and rings.
You can add salt if you want, but I never salt my beets when I eat them so I don't add it when I can them.
Substitutions
If your pressure canner is out and heated up you can process anything extra you have laying around at the same time. I had a few handfuls of green beans so I put those in jars and processed them at the same time.
Vegetables You Can Process in 30 Minutes or Less
- Beets
- Carrots
- Okra
- Chicken Stock/Broth
- Green Beans
- Asparagus
- Peas
- Peppers (hot or sweet)
Equipment
You need a pressure canner, either a weighted gauge or dial gauge model.
Hint: Dial gauge canners are more expensive and more popular, but I like to use a weighted gauge canner because dial gauges need to be adjusted occasionally to make sure they're still accurate. Weights do not. Therefore weighted gauge canners don't need any maintenance over their lifetime. I've used my Mirro 22 quart weighted gauge pressure canner for 15 year or so of canning and it's been great.
Storage
Keep the jars in a dark cupboard even though you're going to want to show them off. Keeping them away from light and heat is ideal.
Tips
- The night before you plan to do this, wash your canning jars so they're sanitized and ready to go. Make sure you have enough lids.
- You don't have to put your sealers in hot water to soften them. They're now manufactured so there's no need to do this.
Deciding to can my garden beets came when I realized no matter what I'm doing with beets it always starts with me cooking them until they're soft. They aren't the kind of vegetable that you want to leave any crunch left in them.
So instead of storing them fresh all winter and cooking them as I want them, I just canned them as soon as I picked them. Now they're ready for a meal instantly whether I want to use them for a hot side dish with goat cheese and walnuts, or a simple cold beet salad.
Enlightened.
Canning Beets
How to can beets with a pressure canner.
Ingredients
- Beets
- Salt
Instructions
- Wash beets and cut off any stems.
- Boil beets until they're cooked enough that the skins will come off if you rub them with a paper towel. This can be anywhere from 30 minutes - 1 hour.
- Remove skins after cooking and cut beets into quarters or halfs depending on the size of the beet.
- Add beets to jar leaving 1" of headspace.
- Fill jars with boiling water to just cover beets (1" from rim of jar.)
- Wipe rims, add sealer and finger tighten ring.
- Process pint jars for 30 minutes and quart jars for 35 minutes.
Notes
1 pint = 2 cups
1 quart = 4 cups
You kinda scared the hell out of me when you said you HAVE to pressure can them. I was in PICKLED beet mode and thought I was lucky I didn't die after eating the ones I made before and only heat processed in a water bath. Whew! Glad I realized it when I saw there was no vinegar involved in these. But I eagerly await the huge bags of beets to appear at the local Fortino's at $2.00 a bag or whatever stupid low price they sell them for, so I can make another huge batch of pickled beets to live off of. Just need to figure out what I could do with huge bags of onions and carrots too.
My squeeze has gone carnivore at the start of the year, so any veggies are all mine. I just made pickled eggs last week (without sugar so he could eat them too) and I'll be making more this week because we polished them off already.
Beets: YUCK!
LOL. I was waiting for that comment from someone! ~ karen
OOOOf! I just pulled up my beets yesterday and used your spiced canning recipe! I do own a pressure cooker now, though, so if I find your miracle "cheap" beets anywhere I'll give it a shot. Here in Massachusetts a "bunch" of beets at the store is 2 or 3 sorta big but not big big beets, and they go about $3 or more a bunch.
Did someone on tik tok do a beet thing? Like the cucumber run on stores that just happened?
Ok, I don’t want to get in trouble for this, but I think you and Randy P should meet
I cannot imagine a better reason to dig out my passport and take a little road trip from Chicago.
Now if “we” can just get Karen’s attention. Hellooo Karen…
The multiple mythical gods and goddesses know I don't like beets and all my veggies do come from a can, so that's close anyway. But nonetheless I fondly recall the farm-life adage - "You eat what you can, and what you can't, you can." And may I make so bold as to note you look super cute in that green bean pic.
First, yes I do want to be Laura Ingalls as a matter of fact. And I imagine 98% of your readership does too! I don’t can beets, but I’ve decided I like eating them. And this inspires me to at least eat more of them this fall and winter. Second: I have a 2024 beet story: this past May, we had the great fortune to go to Scandinavia for a once in a lifetime trip. The week before we were to leave, we got Covid. We were cleared to go literally the day of departure. Then, on our first full night there, my husband emerged from the bathroom saying he was peeing blood. I was trying to remain calm; that was a challenge in a post Covid/jetlagged/euphoric “we are finally here!” state. After about 10 minutes, he remembered that he had had fresh beet juice earlier at a super cool veggie café in the hippie part of Copenhagen. Crisis averted!! (And we had an incredible time!)
Sounds wonderful…. the trip not the pink pee part. How long was it and which countries? Any recommendations? I’ve always wanted to go never made it. 🤷🏼♀️ Yet.
Thanks.
It was incredible and we highly recommend it! We were there for three weeks. Copenhagen, Oslo and Bergen, Stockholm, and Helsinki. Norway was our favorite country for sure. They’re all wonderful and the Scandinavian way of life is incredible. Go for it!
PS Randy is right , you looked cute in that photo! :)