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Comment by batch12 | Hacker News Reader

Canning food is pretty simple for those that can follow instructions. I've found the Ball Blue Book Guide to Preserving to be a good resource for anyone starting out.

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A digression from tin cans:

Amazingly enough for home use of these Ball jars, I bought six "Ball Quilted Crystal Jelly Jars with Lids and Bands" to make Starbucks-style sous-vide egg bites. They were awesome-tasting, but the glass sides separated from the bottoms in three of them.

My hypothesis: I wouldn't blame Ball for this. It was probably a use that they didn't foresee or endorse.

The recipe tells you to only finger-tighten the lids, so the gases can escape during sous-vide'ing. This is error-prone, and if the gases can't escape, then you have an explosion waiting to happen. No explosion happens but the jar does fall apart.

dont let the glass jar rest on the bottom of the pan directly. Canners have a metal plate you put on the bottom for that; but toothpicks will work fine.

Yeah this is probably the issue if they aren't using a rack or plate.

Thanks. With sous-vide you don't have a heat source below the pot, so does that still apply?

From memory, the water bath was 161F. The pot most likely is not much hotter than that, if it's hotter at all.

From what I understand, in addition to the problem of the heat differential between the jar and pot, steam will form under the jar and cause them to bounce. The bouncing can cause the jars to break.

but in this case, the temperature doesn't go above boiling, so no steam, and I would presume no resulting bounce.

You get steam (or vapor) below the boiling point. Look for example here:

https://www.straightdope.com/21343295/how-can-water-turn-to-...

Sous vide also circulates. I have done infusions in a ball jar and it does end up bouncing around a bit. I like the idea of a small towel mentioned elsewhere in the thread.

Glass to glass heat conduction is faster than water to glass. any difference in how fast the jar is heating will produce uneven stresses and possibly crack the glass where those meet. That's my theory.

Ive had jars fail because they were touching each other on the sides; but that i put down to mechanical battering.

There's also the fact that Ball jars have gotten thinner in the past few decades; after they became almost the entire food packaging industry.

My family used towels, at least for water bath canning.

Interesting. I wonder if they were designed to fail this way. Even when canning you only finger-tighten the lids. You also have to be careful not to reduce pressure too quickly or you can break jars or lose liquid out of them.

Finger tighten (use just three fingers) then back off a half to 3/4 turn.

Thanks for all the ideas. I should mention that I do six jars at a time in the water bath, so they can definitely bump into each other.

I don't know if I'm going to try this again, though. It was a lot of trouble.

Canning food is pretty simple for those that can follow instructions.

It isn't too difficult (i've done it), but seriously: Follow the instructions, use tested recipes, and use the proper equipment. If it says to use a pressure canner, it is so you do not get botulism or another food-borne illness. Your chances of getting sick from canned goods is higher with home canning than commercial canning - following the instructions greatly reduces this.

If you don't have a pressure canner, you'll be limited in the things you can safely can - luckily, these will include jellies and tomatoes.

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