A water bath canner is used with all high acid foods. This includes: all fruits, jams, jellies, pie fillings, pickles or condiments and tomatoes with added lemon juice.

If you have any low acid foods or ingredients you must use a pressure canner.

Water Bath Canner

 

A water bath canner is pretty basic. All you need is a large pot deep enough to cover your jars with two inches of boiling water. 

Any pot will work as long as it is deep enough to have 2 to 3 inches of water covering the tops of your jars as it boils.  

It must also have a rack to keep the jars off the bottom of the pot. The water must flow around the jars and the jars must not touch the bottom of the pot. 

A pot specifically made for water bath canning makes things very easy, as it comes with a rack for your jars. They area also relatively inexpensive and can be found used.

On a standard canner this rack will have "hooks" on the handles that will hook to the side of the canner and hold the jars up out of the water.  Then the jars can be lowered into the canner when ready.

If you are using a stock pot, you can use what ever you have on hand as a rack. It does not need to hang on the side of the canner.  It's most important function is keeping the jars off the bottom.  The rack can be as simple as a rack from a round roasting pan.  What ever will fit in your pot.  

Canner Sizes

A standard, 21.5 quart boiling water bath  will hold up to seven 1-quart jars.

Smaller 11.5 quart pots will hold up to seven 1-pint jars.

Large, 33 quart pots will hold up to 9 1-quart jars.

Since I put up a lot of jars each year, I wanted to purchase a large capacity pot in order to jar nine quarts at a time. I put off purchasing one because I was concerned about how it would fit on my standard sized stove.

One day I was at an auction and there was a beautiful blue large 9 quart water bath canner--complete with jars!  I bid on it and won!! I got it at a great price—I love auctions!.




This larger size pot fits over two burners on my stove, and it works perfectly fine.

It does take a little longer to heat. This is to be expected because it holds so much more water. If I am canning a lot of something it is nice to be able process nine quarts at a time. When canning several batches in a row, the canner does not have to reheat all that water as it is already hot from the first batch.  The heating time is more noticeable only when I have a single batch to process.

The rack with this canner does not work well with the smaller pints and half pints. They tend to slide through the gaps.  In addition, there would be so much wasted space between your jars, you'd be heating much more water than necessary.   I'd recommend replacing with a different rack if you plan on doing many pints or half pints.  

Stainless Steel Canner

If you intend to purchase new equipment, I would recommend getting a stainless steel water bath canner. They are a bit more expensive, but are a higher quality product and will last.

The stainless steel pot is much sturdier and doubles as a stock pot for other cooking.  

Another positive thing about stainless steel is they can be used on flat top stoves. I don't have personal experience with this, so check with your stove manufacturer; however the makers and reviewers say it is perfectly safe.

Steam Canner

Finally there is the steam canner. This is sold as a substitute for a water bath.

The jars are placed in the shallow bottom portion with water. The top is placed over the jars. The water is brought to a boil which causes steam to build up inside.

You should know that the USDA does NOT endorse steam canning. (not to be confused with pressure canning) They have not researched them enough to make any safety recommendations.

The concern is whether the steam will bring the jars and contents to the heat level needed to ensure safety.

I don't have one and have no experience with it. However I have heard good things about this canner and I LOVE the idea of only heating a few inches of water.  You'll have to be the judge as to whether this is safe for your family or not.

Articles for more information

Equipment - Canners and other specialty tools can be found in one place here.

Tomatoes Tomatoes the new low acid.

Water Bath Canning - step by step instructions on how to use a water bath canner.  

 

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