Can you add bacon to vegetables before canning?
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Can you add bacon to vegetables like green beans or greens before canning?
Jeanette recently asked if she could add raw bacon to turnip greens before pressure canning.
Can Bacon Be Canned?
No, Bacon is not safe for home canning. You shouldn’t add bacon, bacon grease, or any meat to vegetables before canning unless the recipe has been specifically tested that way.
I know bacon feels like a small addition, and I know you’ll see instructions on how to do this all over the internet. But from a canning standpoint, it changes everything. For greens, green beans, potatoes, or any other vegetable.
Let’s talk about why it’s not a good idea, and what you can do instead.
Why Bacon Changes the Safety of Canned Vegetables
When you’re canning vegetables like greens or green beans, you’re working with a tested process designed specifically for plain vegetables. Vegetable, water, and salt. That’s it.
As soon as you add bacon, bacon grease, or any meat product, you’ve added; Fat and/or meat.
That means the original processing time is no longer valid.
Even a small amount of bacon makes it a different food, and there simply aren’t tested home canning recipes for vegetables canned with bacon mixed in. Without testing, there’s no way to know if the jar is heating thoroughly enough to be safe.
So unfortunately, adding bacon before processing isn’t something I can recommend.
This Applies to All Vegetables (Not Just Greens)
While this question usually comes up with:
- Turnip greens
- Collard greens
- Mustard greens
The same rule applies to any vegetable, including:
- Green beans
- Peas
- Carrots
- Mixed vegetables
If it’s a vegetable-only canning recipe, meat or bacon grease should not be added before processing.
The Safe Way to Get Bacon Flavor
Here’s the good news—you don’t have to give up the flavor.
Instead of adding bacon before canning, add it when you open the jar to serve it. When you’re ready to heat your vegetables:
Simply fry up some bacon, chop it up a bit, and add it to the pot when you heat your veggies for dinner. Or you can also add the beans or greens to the pan you fried the bacon in. It’ll incorporate that leftover bacon grease into your veggie dish.
- Add a little cooked bacon
- Or stir in a small spoonful of bacon grease
- Heat and serve as usual
You still get that salty, smoky, ‘bacony’ flavor, but the vegetables are canned safely on their own. And the bacon is not boiled. I don’t like soggy bacon anyway.
What About Canning Green Beans with Bacon?
Don’t can them together, just combine them at serving time. You’ll get the same flavors. (and not soggy bacon too!)
This works just as well with leafy greens, green beans, carrots… Really it works with any vegetable.
Those two together give you the best of both worlds—safe canning and good flavor.