85 mins ?

[Granny]

Originally Posted by bcday

The explanation I found and posted above says to process tomatoes in their own juice for 1 hour and 25 minutes, which by my math equals 85 minutes, not 45. So the processing time in their own juice would be the same as for "no added liquid", right? The only ones processed for 45 minutes are those packed in water.

Guess I misread the middle bit. My apologies.

Meanwhile, have a gander at the various timings here - National Center for Home Food Preserving
http://www.uga.edu/nchfp/how/can3_tomato.html

Hot pack tomato and vegetable juice gets 40 minutes processing while straight tomatoes hot packed get 85? Does not compute. My pre 1994 canning books (these documents were last revised in 1994) say 45 minutes.

The Farm Journal Freezing and Canning Cookbook actually goes into the new, longer (then) processing times. They mention newer low acid tomato varieties and a couple of cases of botulism in home canned products as the cause of the increase. The most cogent explanation that they give for the cases of botulism (not supposed to happen in acidic foods) is canning of tomatoes that are from dead plants, over ripe or somehow decayed in spots, leading to a pH higher than 4.5. And botulism spores would be the only reason that I can think of for processing tomatoes for 85 minutes. The rational for overprocessing whole tomatoes while not doing so to chopped or juiced tomatoes (even when combined with vegetables that are not normally canned by boiling water bath) escapes me though.

Still have not found any evidence though - just the bald statement of 85 minutes. that is one recommendation I have absolutely NO intention of following any more than I will follow the USDA's latest recommendation to eliminate corn from my diet so that I can be "healthier". (Read "so that there is more available for High fructose corn syrup and biofuel.)

But then I have yet to figure out how the heck Salmonella (enteric bacteria, found in manure) has managed to find its way inside of unshelled almonds (grown on trees, machine harvested, never touch the ground) so that all almonds sold in the US must now be "pasteurized" - and thus denatured.

[bcday]

Originally Posted by Granny

But then I have yet to figure out how the heck Salmonella (enteric bacteria, found in manure) has managed to find its way inside of unshelled almonds (grown on trees, machine harvested, never touch the ground)

All the information I could find about Salmonella in almonds just said raw almonds, not necessarily unshelled. They could have been the shelled whole almonds or pieces, unless you have more info than I could find with Google.

My best guess for the source is bird droppings rather than manure from the ground, and we know from Salmonella in hens' eggs that birds do get infected with Salmonella.

There is bound to be bird poop on the hulls of some of the nuts. Sure, washing the almond hulls before hulling and shelling will clean off most of the poop, but does it remove all the Salmonella?

And if the birds get a chance they'll get into the processing plant to eat spilled pieces of shelled nuts as well, potentially contaminating the processing equipment there with droppings. And in fact one inspection did find bird droppings and even a bird's nest in one area that happened to not be in use at the time of the inspection.

But it doesn't look like anyone has really figured out exactly how the almond contamination occurred even if birds turned out to be the source.

If the source was birds, it makes me wonder how safe it is to eat a fresh apple (or peach, or pear, or...)

http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache...lnk&cd=1&gl=us

[Granny]

The notification that I received a while back said that all raw almonds were going to have to be pasteurized - including the unshelled ones, which are of course raw.

Re Salmonella in birds, it is normal flora in chickens but do note that in chickens the bacteria appears in eggs or as a contaminate if the meat is not properly handled during slaughtering. It isn't something that is normally part & parcel of chicken poop. If it were everyone in the country who raised chickens would have salmonella - and that is not the case at all.

[bcday]

Thanks for clearing that up, Granny. Now I can stop worrying about eating an apple! Pasteurized almonds...there goes the price of almonds.