A month or so ago, I tried an experiment. I got some Oscar Meyer wieners and some Ball Park franks, and I tried canning them. Now these are all regular length hot dogs, and they were a bit longer than the wide mouth pint jars I wanted to put them in. I ended up trimming them to make a suitable headspace, and processed them in a pressure canner as for any meat product. The first batch (6 jars) canned up well. After two weeks I tried some of them out. The hot dogs all settled in the jars during processing, creating more headspace, and dropped a bit of liquid. However, the Oscar Meyer wieners kept their shape and their consistency, and cooked up nicely in a skillet. The Ball Park franks plumped up, but also got mushy soft, and were more like Vienna sausages than hot dogs. The way they are seasoned, they also tasted like Vienna sausages. Those are now canned dog food. But I will retain the Oscar Meyers for personal consumption.

A couple weeks ago I came across a deal on Oscar Meyer All Beef wieners. Unlike the regular wieners, which are made of pork, chicken and beef products, these are all beef. They are fairly spendy for wieners, but these were half off, so I bought 16 packages. This time, I opted not to trim them, hoping they too would settle and create the headspace during processing. They are sold as two Ziploc bags of 5, for a total of 10 per package. I can get 8 wieners into a jar, with enough room for settling. Last night I processed 20 jars and they all sealed properly. They look good, and I expect they will be just as tasty as the first batch. No more cheap franks. I figure other quality wieners will work as well. Hebrew National, Sabrett, Nathan's, all of them should work just fine.

Just another great way to put up some meat. Keeps the freezer clear for game and fish, and the sausage I have yet to crank out.