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This canning process is known as a rebel one, so if you’re dying over the title, you may not belong here. BUT… this blog post will dive into WHY I can potatoes this way, WHY I’m comfortable with it with common sense science, and HOW I do it. So, if you’re interested in hearing what I do on my homestead, buckle in for a good read full of helpful thought provoking commentary mixed with a bit of sarcasm and humor. This method is for all different types of potatoes with white flesh; sweet potatoes have different times! This is the simplest way to can potatoes for an easy meal or side dish that will fry up so crispy in delicious in minutes.

Canning potatoes is always one that scares people. Why? Botulism. As if the masses don’t just think home canning causes botulism, there are folks that have worked through that and come to the thought that only root vegetables “harbor” the botulinum bacteria and spore. Which, I guess they’re slightly correct as it can be found in dirt, but that’s not the only place. Then you’ll hear, YOU CAN ONLY USE TESTED RECIPES OR YOU’LL GET BOTULISM…. that’s absolutely insane and let’s unpack that one first (because they’re really sharing misinformation, and we’ve all learned that that’s bad unless the misinformation suits your agenda). You are NOT inherently protected from botulism just because you use a tested recipe. If you’re gross and dirty, you can use a tested recipe all you want, and botulism can still get into your jars. So we have to ask, how is it even getting into my jars? Once you get that question answered, you’ll know that what I’m doing in this recipe here with my potatoes isn’t that insane. Our canning times were found by testing different foods with different densities and then plotted on a logarithmic curve to be able to calculate all canning process times according to that curve in relation to time, temperature, and acidity. Jars were then inoculated with a “clostridium botulinum-like” pathogen that was nearly two times more heat resistant than botulism actually is in MASSIVE UNNATURAL amounts in the very center of the jars and then processed and tested for spoilage and for presence of botulism and the inoculation bacteria. (If you’d like to read all about how our canning times came to be, read here. I wrote a super interesting blog post alllllllll about that!) The processing times were then selected from inoculated jars that did not show signs of spoilage, as the botulinum-like inoculant caused very quick spoilage due to gas production which would cause the lid to bulge and then fail. That means we are MASSIVELY overprocessing our foods in the name of safety, which is understandable but also major overkill, meaning that clostridium botulinum spores ARE NOT GOING TO SURVIVE the canning process, unless you’re going completely rogue on canning times… which then I’d say you’re asking for it.

In This Post You'll Find...

What is Dry Pack Canning?

This frequently gets confused with dry canning and vacuum sealing, so I’m here to set ya straight with how I use the terms and how I think they should be used.

Dry canning is when folks put jars of dry goods (flour, oats, rice) into an oven and heat it enough to then add a lid and seal them. It was a method used long before fancy vacuum sealers were a thing.

Vacuum sealing, which is unfortunately also called dry canning amongst the hOmEsTeAdEr crowd, is not canning at all. It’s vacuum sealing, meaning you’re filling a jar with DRY GOODS ONLY (not food that needs to be heat processed by canning to actually be shelf stable, we’re again talking flour, rice, beans, pasta), then adding a lid and sucking all the air out with a vacuum sealer to extend the shelf life and protect your goods from pests and moisture.

Dry pack canning is what I’m talking about in this post. It means you are packing the food into the jar and NOT adding any extra liquid and then processing by a heating method, whether it be steam, pressurized steam, or boiling water. Your recipes in a TeStEd book will call for you to pour over boiling water to headspace and when you dry pack can, you skip that step and leave the food dry. This method is perfect for root veggies. All of them. The texture and flavor is much better than those packed in liquid in my opinion.

Why am I comfortable doing this? Because potatoes are over 70% water. When they are heated, especially in the canning jar, that water is released as steam. That means the jar is filled with hot steam from the potatoes, along with the fibers within the potato will conduct that heat just fine. The thermal process is definitely happening and to refute that is to ignore science. I would argue that adding water to the veggies actually insulates them further keeping the heat from penetrating sooner as opposed to dry packing where nothing but air impedes the heat which will quickly be conducted by steam. You can also dry pack meat…. also known as raw packing and somehow that’s not a dangerous.

As with everything, if you’re not comfortable with this method, just don’t do it. You’ll be afraid of your food and won’t use it, so you’d have wasted your time and money doing so. If in doubt of any food you can, throw it out or at least heat to a boil for 10 minutes. This denatures the botulinum toxin if it is even present (very likely not). I don’t eat any of the potatoes cold out of the jars when I can because I don’t like them that way… I find the flavor and texture is much better crispy so they’re air fried, tallow fried, or baked prior to eating. When you grow your own potatoes, you have to be prepared to preserve the excess because they will eventually sprout, especially my favorite red potatoes which decided to start a whole month early on me this year, so I’m busy busy. Home food preservation allows to you to preserve food you’d normally have to toss!

To Peel or Not To Peel

This one’s always a hot topic, because everyone is like OMG THE PEELS HARBOR BOTULISM, yer gonna dieeeeee. To which I say, OMG clean your produce you dirtbag. But seriously. That’s all you have to do is scrub your potatoes and boom, she gone. She being the botulinum spores. I’d go out on a ledge and say that a high percentage of the peelers don’t clean the peeler in between each stroke, nor do they wash their potatoes again after peeling. I mean, there’s people that don’t even wash their store bought potatoes before eating them! (EW). The rule to peel potatoes very likely came from whoever was doing the testing decided to only do peeled potatoes because most Americans probably peel their potatoes. Why waste time and precious money testing them both ways. Even though, common sense would tell you the thin skin on a potato is NOT going to change its density. The assumption that most potatoes were peeled then turned into the USDA adopting the ONLY can peeled potatoes and the humpers then snowballing that into the ‘you’ll die mentality‘. Insane. Honestly.

I do not peel potatoes that I grow. That’s big dumb and I’m not wasting my time doing that. We like the peels and it’s so dang time consuming that my little hands would be stuck in claws before I was done. My hand crank apple peeler doesn’t work well for the lumpy lurch potatoes I grow and I’m not buying another gadget to have to store. Now, if it were storebought, them peels would be leaving. Lord only knows what’s been sprayed on them.

How to Clean Your Potatoes

My potatoes are from the dirt, so they have dirt on them. Yours do, too, even if they’re from the store. Start by placing your potatoes in your sink and filling with cool water. I soak mine for a few minutes and then get to work scrubbing them really well under running water with a stiff vegetable brush and removing and sprouts or eyes along the way. I give them one final rinse and then add them to a clean bowl. Once I’m done with the initial scrub, I add a couple good glugs of vinegar to the bowl and fill it with water and soak the potatoes for 10 minutes just to clean them further. I then remove the potatoes from that water, give one good final onceover and rinse them again. After this, I will cut into whatever shape I want them in and start the prep process for canning.

If the botulinum spore was all over your potatoes, it isn’t anymore. Simply washing them and not being a dirty rat in the kitchen is all you need.

Water Bath versus Pressure Canning Potatoes

This one’s always a hot topic as well, because everyone thinks you can’t water bath low-acid food or, again, you’ll die. You won’t, but you do need to extend the processing time and also heat your food prior to consuming. We’re talking boil the food for 5-10 minutes before eating, even if it’s for something cold, like a potato salad. That’s how I was taught and how I will continue to do so. It’s not that hard to heat your food. Then you’re going to hear the argument that boiling after opening the jar doesn’t denature the spore, which is correct. Then people are going to tell you that babies and adults at risk for intestinal colonization, meaning the spore is ingested an an aerobic environment is found in the intestine due to slow motility, and then produces the toxin that way, are still at risk. Well yeah. But they’re at risk with everything… it’s not just canned food. It’s store bought food, it’s dirt on the floor, it’s dust on the furniture, it’s everywhere. So, again, the risk isn’t just deduced to only home canning. So, that argument doesn’t really hold any weight when they go there.

This recipe is already rebel canning (unapproved method), so let’s just make it worse. Because information is information. The water bath times for potatoes are 3 hours in the US and 2 hours for German canning times. Folks have processed low acid foods in canning jars in a water bath for generations and I promise you they all didn’t die of botulism. Anyone that got sick was from negligence or ignorance. Don’t believe me? Read the cases for yourself. I encourage everyone to learn both the water bath times and the pressure canning times for all foods because you never know when you’d need it. For me, if we’d have an extended power outage and I’d need to can things that were going bad, I’d rather run a water bath canner over an open fire than a pressure canner.

To pressure can potatoes, the times are 35 minutes for pint jars and 40 minutes for quart jars. The recommended way is a hot-pack method which is to peel, heat by dipping in boiling water for 2 minutes, and then hot pack and top with fresh boiling water. Heating them through ensures even heating and allows the canner to heat up quickly and prevent siphoning, as well as removes a bit more starch and shrinking the potatoes prior to packing to give you nice full jars. With dry packing, there isn’t anything to siphon :D

Let’s can the best potatoes!

Equipment You Might Want:

Mandoline
Food Processor
French Fry Cutter
Large Bowl or Pot
Fine Mesh Strainer
Canning Jars
Canning Lids & Screw Bands
Jar Funnel
Jar Lifter
Pressure Canner

Ingredients:

PER QUART JAR

1 1/4 – 2 1/2 lbs of potatoes (depending on how they’re cut)

Step 1: Prep Potatoes

Scrub and rinse your potatoes well. If you’d like to know how I do it, see above in the blog post under the “washing your potatoes” section.

Peel potatoes if you’re doing that and cut them into the shape you prefer. I do french fries, steak fries, cubed & shredded hashbrowns, and slices.

As you work, place cut potatoes in a bowl with cold water.

Step 2: Soak Potatoes

Allow the potatoes to soak in the bowl of cool water for about 1 hour.

Dump the water and rinse the potatoes really well. Fill the bowl back up with water and add the potatoes. Allow to soak for 1-2 more hours. If the water is clear or only slightly cloudy, go ahead and drain and give them a good rinse and you can start canning. Let them drain really well before packing jars.

*More starchy potatoes (those with a high starch content) may need an extra soak or two*

I have let the potatoes sit in a large pot with a lid overnight and soak and they were just fine, in case you get tight on time! Just make sure they’re submerged in water because raw potatoes will oxidize and turn an unsightly gray.

Step 3: Pack Jars

I do not season the potatoes prior to canning, but rather prefer to season after opening. If you desire, season them however you like and toss in a bowl to coat.

Add potatoes to the jars, not worrying about headspace, but filling jars to the very top, packing as tightly as possible. Raw-pack potatoes do shrink quite a bit after canning due to releasing their liquid and there being no extra liquid in the jars to keep them suspended and floating.

Add a small bit of bacon fat, tallow, or butter to the top. This helps with flavor and also melts down the potatoes during canning to keep them from sticking together so bad. You don’t have to add anything if you don’t want to, but I’d recommend it.

Do not add any canning liquid to the jars. This is dry pack canning; we are packing the potatoes dry.

Once jars are filled, wipe rims and add lids and screw bands, tightening according to manufacturer’s instruction.

Step 4: Canning

Place jars in your pressure canner. If they float, you can weight them down with a plate or canning rack and a rock or brick to keep them from floating.

Process pint jars for 35 minutes and quart jars for 40 minutes at your elevations required pressure for low acid foods.

Once processing time is complete, allow canner to completely depressurize before removing jars to cool undisturbed for 18-24 hours.

Water Bath Canning (Unapproved, Rebel Canning): Process all jars in a boiling water bath for 2-3 hours (depending on which time guidelines you use), being sure they are submerged at least to the product line. When you are ready to consume anything low acid that has been processed in a water bath, please be sure and heat them thoroughly prior to consumption (see above in the blog post for more info).

Step 5: Storage

Once cooled, remove bands, test seals, wash jars, label and store in a cool dark place away from direct sunlight.

Shelf life is ’til you eat them. If the seal is good, they are good. Aim to use canned goods in about 2 years for best flavor and nutrition, but they’ll last longer if you need them too and be just fine.

Notes:

Russet potatoes turn gray even though you soak them. They taste fine, they just look pretty unappetizing in the jars. I don’t grow them or can them for this reason and stick to kennebec and reds.

The bottom of dry pack canned potatoes will have a little starchy glue blob sometimes. This is completely normal. You can dump the jar and rinse it off and they’re just fine!

Enjoy your home-canned potatoes!

A Guide to Canning Potatoes (Dry Packing Method)

5 from 1 vote

Print Pin Rate

Prep Time: 15

Canning Time: 40

Servings: quart

Author: Ruby – Red Feather Farm

Equipment

Mandoline
Food processor
French fry cutter
Large Bowl or Pot
Fine mesh strainer
Canning jars
Canning lids & screw bands
jar funnel
jar lifter
Pressure Canner

Ingredients

PER QUART JAR

1 1/4 – 2 1/2 lbs of potatoes depending on how they’re cut

Instructions

Scrub and rinse your potatoes well. If you’d like to know how I do it, see above in the blog post under the “washing your potatoes” section.
Peel potatoes if you’re doing that and cut them into the shape you prefer. I do french fries, steak fries, cubed & shredded hashbrowns, and slices.
As you work, place cut potatoes in a bowl with cold water.
Allow the potatoes to soak in the bowl of cool water for about 1 hour.
Dump the water and rinse the potatoes really well. Fill the bowl back up with water and add the potatoes. Allow to soak for 1-2 more hours. If the water is clear or only slightly cloudy, go ahead and drain and give them a good rinse and you can start canning. Let them drain really well before packing jars.
*More starchy potatoes (those with a high starch content) may need an extra soak or two*
I have let the potatoes sit in a large pot with a lid overnight and soak and they were just fine, in case you get tight on time! Just make sure they’re submerged in water because raw potatoes will oxidize and turn an unsightly gray.
I do not season the potatoes prior to canning, but rather prefer to season after opening. If you desire, season them however you like and toss in a bowl to coat prior to packing in the jar. With no extra liquid, you can't just put the seasoning on top.
Add potatoes to the jars, not worrying about headspace, but filling jars to the very top, packing as tightly as possible. Raw-pack potatoes do shrink quite a bit after canning due to releasing their liquid and there being no extra liquid in the jars to keep them suspended and floating.
Add a small bit of bacon fat, tallow, or butter to the top. This helps with flavor and also melts down the potatoes during canning to keep them from sticking together so bad. You don’t have to add anything if you don’t want to, but I’d recommend it.
Do not add any canning liquid to the jars. This is dry pack canning; we are packing the potatoes dry.
Once jars are filled, wipe rims and add lids and screw bands, tightening according to manufacturer’s instruction.
Place jars in your pressure canner. If they float, you can weight them down with a plate or canning rack and a rock or brick to keep them from floating.
Process pint jars for 35 minutes and quart jars for 40 minutes at your elevations required pressure for low acid foods.
Once processing time is complete, allow canner to completely depressurize before removing jars to cool undisturbed for 18-24 hours.
Water Bath Canning (Unapproved, Rebel Canning): Process all jars in a boiling water bath for 2-3 hours (depending on which time guidelines you use), being sure they are submerged at least to the product line. When you are ready to consume anything low acid that has been processed in a water bath, please be sure and heat them thoroughly prior to consumption (see above in the blog post for more info).
Once cooled, remove bands, test seals, wash jars, label and store in a cool dark place away from direct sunlight.
Shelf life is ’til you eat them. If the seal is good, they are good. Aim to use canned goods in about 2 years for best flavor and nutrition, but they’ll last longer if you need them too and be just fine.

Notes