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September is Food Safety Education Month

Posted on by Karen Blakeslee

As September approaches, it is time to encourage and remind all consumers about safe food handling steps to prevent foodborne illness.

Although most healthy people will recover from a foodborne illness within a short period of time, some can develop chronic, severe, or even life-threatening health problems. In addition, some people are at a higher risk for developing foodborne illness, including pregnant women, young children, older adults, and people with weakened immune systems (such as transplant patients and individuals with HIV/AIDS, cancer, or diabetes). To keep your family safer from food poisoning, follow these four simple steps: clean, separate, cook, and chill.

Learn more about handling food safely at https://bookstore.ksre.ksu.edu/pubs/at-home-safe-food-handling-its-in-your-hands_MF2465.pdf.

Business Builder Grant Opportunity

Posted on by Karen Blakeslee

Buisness Builder Grant

A new grant opportunity called the Business Builder grant was recently announced by the USDA through the Heartland Regional Food Business Center. The grant will support local and regional food enterprises across the supply chain, from suppliers to buyers.

This program is designed to promote business expansion, job creation, business capacity building, and increase local products in the local market throughout the Heartland Region, including Kansas. Please share this opportunity with partners, entrepreneurs, and others across Kansas who may benefit.

The grant provides the chance to be awarded $5,000 to $50,000 that can be used for consultants, staffing for projects, supplies, equipment and more! The deadline for applying for this grant is Oct 15, 2024, and estimated awards will be announced in early 2025.

Business Builder Grant

Get More Information About the Grant

There is an informational webinar on applying for the Business Builder grant on August 28, 2024, 12 – 1 pm, Central Time. A recording will be available after the meeting, just in case you miss it!

Through the grant, recipients can also gain one-on-one counseling offered by Heartland Regional Food Business Center partners and collaborators right here in Kansas!

About the Heartland Regional Food Business Center

The Heartland Heartland Regional Food Business Center, led by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and rural Missouri community development corporation New Growth, focuses on expanding the local and regional food system in Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, and northwest Arkansas. It conducts this work as a regional team with 14 Key Partners and 20 Collaborators across the five states. K-State Research and Extension and Kansas Rural Center are two of 14 key partners implementing the Heartland Regional Food Business Center.  Click here to learn more about the HRFBC’s Kansas offerings.
Don’t miss out on this amazing opportunity to support the growth of your community!

Questions? Complete the contact form at heartlandfoodbusiness.org/contact/ or email heartlandrfbc@ksu.edu. For more about this grant and other opportunities, join the Heartland Regional Food Business Center Newsletter for all the updates to come.

Teach Kids Food Safety Practices

Posted on by Karen Blakeslee
Teach kids food safety
Food Safety for Kids from the Partnership for Food Safety Education

Established by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Foundation in 2014, Kids Eat Right Month is observed each August and focuses on the importance of healthful eating and active lifestyles for kids and families.

As you may know, children are disproportionately affected by serious foodborne illnesses. They represent half of all hospitalizations for foodborne illness in the United States each year.

These activities are perfect for talking to kids and families about food safety:

Share these food safety tips with kids and their families to keep them safe this season and year round!

Drying Foods at Home

Posted on by Karen Blakeslee
Freeze Dried Raspberries
Freeze dried raspberries
Photo: Canva.com

Drying, or dehydrating, foods at home can help extend the shelf-life of seasonal produce, preserve more nutrients in foods, and help provide shelf-stable foods that are easy to store. Interest in drying foods has increased with more affordable equipment options.

One method that has gained momentum is freeze drying foods at home. This method uses a specialized piece of equipement that uses a combination of vacuum pressure and heat to dry food. The first stage freezes food to -40°F which converts moisture to ice crystals. Then, under vacuum, the trays of food are heated to convert ice crystals to a steam vapor. This vapor is removed and 90 to 95% of the moisture leaves the food. This process can take hours to days depending on the food.

The cost of home freeze dryers can range from $2,400 and up depending on vendor, model, accessories, etc.

While freeze drying produces very dry food product, it does not kill bacteria. So, it is important to handle food safely to prevent contamination or cross-contamination. It is also important to read the instruction manual for the equipment to learn about specific guidelines and safe operating procedures.

Source: Let’s Preserve: Drying Foods at Home, NebGuide G2363 and Freeze-drying Food, University of Minnesota Extension

Reusing Pickling Brine

Posted on by Karen Blakeslee
pickles
Photo: KSRE

If you make pickles, you may find that you have leftover pickling brine. Can it be reused? That depends on how it was originally used.

If the vegetables were soaked or heated in the pickling brine prior to filling the jars, it CANNOT be reused for another batch.

  • Once vegetables are heated or soaked, pH changes
  • Produce absorbs brine
  • Pickling brine becomes less acidic

If the vegetables were raw packed into jars, then the pickling brine was added, it CAN be reused for another batch.

Learn more from the National Center for Home Food Preservation, University of Georgia blog post “That Leftover Pickling Brine.”

 

Preserving Tomatoes after a Fall Frost or Freeze

Posted on by Karen Blakeslee

Tomato plants may still produce fresh tomatoes into the Fall season. But, if the tomato vine is dead or killed by a frost or freeze, those tomatoes are not safe for canning. The pH, or acidity, changes in this situation to increase the pH above 4.6. Therefore, the safest choice to preserve these affected tomatoes is by freezing or dehydrating.

Unripe, or green, tomatoes can be preserved just like ripe tomatoes. So when canning them they still require acidification. Here are some ideas to can green tomatoes.

Tomatoes

Learn more about pre-frost tomato harvest at https://www.johnson.k-state.edu/programs/lawn-garden/agent-articles-faqs-and-resources/agent-articles/vegetables/Pre-Frost-Harvest.html.

Preserving Apples

Posted on by Karen Blakeslee

Fall is coming and apple trees are bursting with apples!

Apples can be preserved by canning, freezing, dehydrating, jams, jellies, fruit butter, and pickling. The best varieties for preserving are crisp, cooking varieities. Some suggested varieties for different types of preserving can be found from the University of Illinois Extension.

It is best to preserve the fruit shortly after harvest. Use apples that are neither too green nor too ripe. Avoid using apples held in cold storage for an extended period of time as the pH level can change.

Learn more about preserving apples in Preserve it Fresh, Preserve it Safe: Apples from K-State Research and Extension. More options are available from the National Center for Home Food Preservation.

Preserving Apples
Preserving Apples
Photo: KSRE

Tips for Canning Tomatoes

Posted on by Karen Blakeslee
tomatoes
Photo: USDA Flickr

Many gardeners plant tomatoes and they are starting to ripen. Preserve them by canning, freezing or dehydrating to use later in many recipes. While it is fun to make salsa, spaghetti sauce or even a barbecue sauce, having basic options such as whole tomatoes, tomato juice or tomato sauce allows you to use tomatoes in many more recipes.

Here are some reminders about tomatoes:

  • Although tomatoes are usually considered to be acidic in flavor, most have pH values slightly above 4.6, which makes them a low-acid food. As such, tomato products must be acidified to a pH of 4.6 or below with bottled
    lemon juice, vinegar, or citric acid. Properly acidified tomatoes can be safely processed in a boiling-water canner or pressure canner as an acid food. Learn how to acidify tomatoes in Preserve it Fresh, Preserve it Safe: Tomatoes.
  • Pressure processing instructions are equivalent in heat treatment to water bath processing. Caution: Both methods require acidification. There are no recommendations for processing tomatoes without acidification. The chart in the above publication provides the options for acidification.
  • Tomato-based recipes for products such as salsa, barbecue sauce, ketchup and others will also include added acid. Do not reduce the amount of added acid in these recipes.
  • Tomatillos can be substituted for tomatoes in the same amount stated in a recipe, such as in salsa.
  • Salt is for flavor only and can be omitted, if desired.

Tomatoes

The Science of Freezing Food

Posted on by Karen Blakeslee
Freezing Food
Photo: Newell Brands, Inc.

Freezing food is an easy way to preserve high quality food with maximum nutritional value. But food in the freezer doesn’t last forever as changes will occur during storage.

Freeze food as soon as possible after harvest to stop chemical compounds, called enzymes, that cause deterioration and spoilage. Enzymes are naturally in foods and must be inactivated to stop loss of color and nutrients, as well as flavor changes. Blanching vegetables is an important step to inactivate enzymes. In fruit, color changes are prevented by using pure ascorbic acid (vitamin C) or a commercial ascorbic acid mixture such as Fruit Fresh®.

Because of high water content in fruits and vegetables, texture changes occur. Water expands when frozen which ruptures food cell walls. Freezing food quickly will help reduce texture damage. Don’t overload the freezer with unfrozen food and keep the freezer as cold as possible, at least 0°F or below.

Over time, food loses moisture during freezing which leads to freezer burn. Use packaging designed for freezing to reduce this problem.

Freezing does not kill bacteria, it only slows it down. When food thaws, any bacteria present will become active again. Always inspect food and packages  carefully before use.

Source: https://extension.umn.edu/preserving-and-preparing/science-freezing-foods

Is it Safe to Re-use Pickling Brine?

Posted on by Karen Blakeslee
pickles
Photo: KSRE

Once you heat, or even soak, vegetables in the pickling solution, pH changes start to happen. (Heating makes the interaction happen faster.) The vegetables become more acidic, which is desireable in pickling. However, the pickling solution then becomes less acidic. So if the recipe states to do a hot pack for canned pickles, the vegetables are heated in the pickling solution (“brine”). This leftover brine should not be used for another round of the recipe. The expected ratio of acid to low-acid ingredients and ultimate pH adjustment in the next recipe will not be the same.

In some recipes, sliced raw cucumbers are soaked for hours in the pickling liquid (vinegar, sugar and/or salt, for example). Then the liquid is drained off the cucumber slices into a pan. The soaked raw slices are filled into jars while the liquid is then heated and poured over them. Even though this is a raw pack in terms of filling jars, this vinegar solution had its original pH (acidity) altered from that initial soaking before it was heated and poured into jars. It should not be used again for a canned pickle recipe since it is now of unknown acidity.

If the recipe is a true raw-pack recipe, such as dilled green beans, the vegetables are packed into jars and the hot brine is poured over the vegetables. Any leftover brine used in this scenario can be used again if the brine was initially heated just enough to bring it to a boil.

Source: https://nchfp.uga.edu/blog/that-leftover-pickling-brine

Reference to any specific commercial products, process, service, manufacturer, or company does not constitute its endorsement or recommendation. Paid for by Kansas State University