Beans, Beans the wonderful fruit! The more you eat....Well you know the rest.

I am running out of home canned beans in my pantry so today I decided to can some. I had two bags of 15 Bean Soup Beans that I had been waiting to fix for when we had some one besides my hubby here to eat them because I don't have room in my freezer to put the left overs but with my oldest boy overseas I had no one else to eat them. So today I decided to can them. I used two pounds of beans and 2 cups of diced ham.

I sorted through the dried beans making sure to take out any bad beans, small stones and dirt. 

Then I rinsed the beans several times in cool water and put them in a large stock pot. 

Then I added the cold ham broth that I had made last night after I skimmed the cold fat off. 

Then I added the ham that was on the ham bone I had made the stock out of. 

Looking good already and it isn't even cooked yet! :)

I brought the beans to a boil on high heat and boiled for two minutes then I reduced the heat down to a simmer and let the beans simmer for and hour.

After an hour I drained the beans reserving the broth and put the beans into pint jars leaving a two inch headspace. Added a half a teaspoon of canning salt to each jar. Add the hot broth to with in an inch and a half from the top of the jar. Wiped the rims and added the lids and rings. Then I placed the jars in the pressure canner.

I processed the beans at 10 lbs pressure for 75 minutes. Then let the canner cool down before I took them out of the canner. I got a total of nine pints from two pounds of 15 Bean Soup. One jar did not seal and hubby said that was ok because he would eat it for supper tonight. :)

While the canner was cooling I got my next batch of beans ready to go into the pressure canner. This time I did Baby Butter Beans with Ham. I used about 2 - 2 1/2 pounds of beans and 3 cups of diced ham. 

I sorted the beans and removed and bad beans, small stones and dirt. 

I rinsed the beans several times in cool water then placed them in a large pot along with the ham.

Instead of broth this time I used plain water. I added enough to bring the water level 3 inches above the beans.  I then brought the beans to a boil, let boil on high for two minutes then reduced the heat and let them simmer for 1 hour.

I drained the beans and reserved the water, placed the beans in the jars leaving a 2 1/2 inch headspace. Add a teaspoon of canning salt to each jar. 

Then I added enough of the reserved water to within 1 inch headspace. I wiped the rims and added the two piece lids and placed the jars in the canner. 

I processed them at 10 lbs pressure for 90 minutes. Then turned the heat off and let the canner cool down on its own. I got a total of 7 quarts out of the beans and ham.

 Don't they look good. Now all I will have to do is make a pan of cornbread, fry some potatoes, heat up a jar of beans and we have a belly warming meal that only took about 30 minutes to make. :)