Italian Meatball Soup

Step 1

Fill your pressure canner with 2 to 3 inches of water and place the rack at the bottom. Please follow the instructions that came with your canner for adding the amount of water. Begin heating the water in the bottom of the canner with the lid off.

Step 2

In a large frying pan sauté the cook onions, garlic, celery, and carrots, stirring occasionally, until onions are pale golden, about 4 minutes.

Step 3

Put the onions and vegetables in a bowl and set aside. In a stainless steel pot or enameled dutch oven add broth/stock,water, salt and pepper.  Bring to a boil over medium heat.

Step 4

Leave in pot for 3-5 minutes while you get the jars ready to fill. Remove from heat.

Step 5

You will need 6 pint jars. Put your canning funnel on the jar and using a spoon add 1/4 -1/2 cup of beans, a small handful of spinach, 3 meatballs, and some of the onion/veggie mixture to each jar. Fill each jar with the solids about 3/4 of way full.

Step 6

Using the ladle scoop the hot broth and funnel into each jar to fill to 1" headspace.  Remove air bubbles with your rubber spatula or chopsticks and refill if necessary.

Step 7

Taking a clean damp papertowel, wipe the rims of the jars removing any food particles that would interfere with a good seal for your lids.

Step 8

Using your magic wand extract the lids from the hot water and place them on the now cleaned rims. Add your rings to the tops of each of the jars and turn to seal just "finger tight".

Step 9

Make sure your canning water has come to a simmer and place the jars in the pressure canner.  Lock the lid and turn up the heat bring the canner to a boil.

Step 10

Vent steam for 10 minutes and then close the vent by adding the weighted gauge or pressure regulator (for dial gauge canner).

Step 11

Process pints for 75 minutes and quarts for 90 minutes at 10 lbs of pressure (11 lbs for dial gauge canner). Adjust pressure for altitude.

Step 12

When complete turn off the heat and let pressure return to zero naturally. If you have a lid lock you will want to wait till the lock drops. Wait two minutes longer and remove the weighted gauge or pressure regulator.

Step 13

Remove canner lid. Wait 10 minutes then remove jars and place on dishtowel in a place that they will sit overnight to cool. Do not touch or move them till the next morning.

Step 14

Some time in the next hour your jars will be making a "pinging" or "popping" noise. That is the glass cooling and the reaction of the lids being sucked into the jar for proper sealing. Some recipes may take overnight to seal. Check your lids and reprocess any jars that did not seal. Remove rings for storage.