Couldn't have said it better Art.

I wasen't saying my method was better, But EVERYONE does it where I grew up. I am not some teenager who just started bottling meat on a whim and a first attempt. I have been hunting, preserving, drying and salting game for a long time. If I wasen't 100 % confident about what I was doing I wouldn't do it.

Maybe germs don't fester in the process due to the amount of salt and not the boiling time... I do use a lot of salt.

Salt would kill parasites would it not ?

I was joking about the eating with the fingers part. I guess its because in my job the "field" is different than other peoples vision.

To be fair, you did name the thread "canned meat FIELD test" , not "Canned meat eaten in the comfort of my own home and not remotely anywhere near a field test"

But I digress.

The issue is not so much a living creature that can be killed by boiling, it is about the waste product these microbes excrete into the food. It is not destroyed by heat or salt, and in sufficient quantities it can be fatal, especially to the young and old. There is a huge difference between 'spoiled' food that stinks and pops the lids, and food contaminated by harmful microbes and their waste products.

Salt does kill and prevent microorganisms from growing by drawing water and other moisture out of the food, however you need a lot salt for this.

Back when salting meat was a common practice, meat was salted in tens of lbs of salt all packed into barrels or boxes. When it came time to use the meat, it was rinsed many times to remove the very salty taste. Still a slice or two of salted meat had about 4x times the recommended daily sodium content....which has it's own health risks. Even though in theory, the salt preserved the meat, many people died of food poisoning.

To answer your question about salt used in canning (by any method), the amount of salt required and the fact that canning enhances the salt flavor, you could not use enough salt to help anyway to kill any bacteria due to the chemical reaction with water and also due to the simple fact, the food would be so inedible due to the extremely high salty taste that would make you physically sick.

Actually, salted meat as you describe it, is still a very traditional food in my home province.(Its in a brine opposed to dry salt) The meat is soaked overnight, rinsed and then placed in a pot to boil with all the vegetables where the residual salt flavours the veg. Its called a "Newfie" or "Jiggs" dinner.

I am afraid to say how I preserve fish and meat by using sea salt as I am sure you will all pounce on me like wild cats to start lecturing me on heart attacks

Maybe someone hit the nail on the head when they said I may be lucky due to the fact that botulism(spelling?) is not found often in my neck of the woods. I have heard of it, but I have never heard of anyone actually getting it. Bottling meat is as common as apple pie where I am from and I have never, ever heard of any ill effects.

I have mostly only ever used it on wild meat if that matters. Moose, Caribou, deer, Rabbit(sometimes shellfish) like clams and muscles.

I had some preserved Moose meat for supper today. Tasty as the day I murdered it some 3 years ago. If I die after eating what must be my thousanth bottle over the years then you guys were right and I will switch to cans in the next life.

I've put spam through the field test, repeated freeze/thaw, sit in car in summer for extended periods. After two years of this, it still looks, smells, feels and tastes like Spam, even in when eaten cold right out of the can using my (clean) fingers. As long as the seal doesn't pop, it doesn't really change much.

Mac, you may do anything you want, and eat anything you can get down. I simply wanted to make the point to others here that you weren't offering good advice.

Byrd_Huntr - the first time you did it, the costs would exceed buying it in the grocery store. But for the basic components (pressure canner, jars, rings, lids), the cost would dwindle the more you used it because all of those are almost infinitely reusable except the lids. $300 would get you started and last for years.

And if there happened to be a longer-term power outage and you had a freezer full of meat, you could can a lot of it before it spoiled over a makeshift wood stove. In a longer-term situation, you could can 'wild' meat (a stray cow or flock of pitbulls).

Canning equipment really has to be considered an investment. You know, like power tools! *grinning*

Re: 'Mechanical ventilation': Botulism is a paralytic poison, and if you are being treated for it in a hospital, it is likely that your breathing mechanisms would be paralyzed, and you would be put on a machine that would breathe for you. Do you remember polio?

IL Bob: '... also possible to get botulism poisoning from ingesting contaminated meat or getting the spores in an open wound, so how is it safe to eat pork at 160 degrees?'

The Botulisum toxin is produced from the Clostridium bacteria only under airless (anaerobic) conditions. It won't be created in meats that are exposed to air and cooked thoroughly enough to kill parasites (like 160ºF). So, the Clostridium bacteria can be sitting on your pork roast, waving at you, and when you cook that pork by any method where air is involved, it will be killed. But if the Clostridium is on/in the meat, and the meat is canned using only the waterbath method, the temp won't be high enough to kill the bacteria. Then with the airless conditions within the jar or can, the bacteria will start creating the botulism toxin, which will contaminate the meat. It is colorless, tasteless and otherwise invisible. And it doesn't take very much of the toxin to kill. It has been said that a single pint jar of pure Botulism toxin is enough to poison every person on the face of the earth.

Clostridium in wounds requires the same conditions: no air. That usually means a fairly deep cut or puncture wound that doesn't have exposure to air. (Think twice before using super glue on wounds!) I am assuming that Botulism has sort of the same growth conditions that tetanus has: initial contamination, deep wound, no air. But at least you can be vaccinated against tetanus, but there's no such thing for Clostridium/Botulism.

Sue

As a microbiologist for over 30 years, I can say what Sue has stated as an accurate account of botulism. Here is a nice CDC/MMWR review on food borne illnesses. Pay close attention to the tables on food borne illnesses.

Pete


CDC/MMWR Food Borne Illnesses

I'm also going on record to say non-pressurized canning of meat is a bad accident waiting to happen. One can beat the odds over and over (for instance I still have all my fingers and eyes) but deck is always stacked against us in the long run. I really don't want someone in some botulism-filled envirnoment to try non-pressurized canning meat and kill himself or others because they saw someone here say it was okay. Becoming a moderator here makes me wear my "Safety First" button.

-Blast, digitally intact, but with interesting scars

SPAM, the twinkie of the meat family.