How to Pressure Can Plain Ground Beef in Canada

A shelf of home-canned ground beef is the most useful thing in a Canadian pantry after jam. Open a jar and you’re ten minutes from tacos, chili, spaghetti sauce, shepherd’s pie, or a quick skillet dinner — no thawing, already cooked. When ground beef goes on sale, canning a batch locks in the price and clears the freezer.

Corrected 21 September 2026. This page used to say Bernardin published no tested recipe for plain ground beef, and refused to give a processing time on that basis — it told you to make Meat Sauce, or a different tested recipe, or to freeze the beef instead. That was wrong about the book. The Complete Book of Home Preserving (ISBN 978-0-7788-0137-5) carries Ground Beef, Lamb, Mutton, Pork, Veal or Venison on page 399, and the times are in the step 4 it shares with page 398: 75 minutes for 500 mL jars and 90 for 1 L, at 10 lb. The claim was true of bernardin.ca, which is what had been searched, and it was published as though it were true of everything they print. If you froze ground beef, or skipped canning it, because this page said there was no recipe — there is one, and it is in your edition. Nothing that was canned on this page’s advice is affected: it gave no time to follow.

Pressure canning is the only safe home method for ground beef. Beef is low-acid (pH well above 4.6), and a boiling-water bath tops out at 100 °C — not hot enough to destroy Clostridium botulinum spores. Only a pressure canner reaches the 116 °C that makes low-acid food safe. There is no exception, no amount of “extra boiling,” and no edition of a family recipe that overrides this.

That much is settled. The next question is which tested recipe you follow, and the answer is in the book rather than on the website.

What Bernardin publishes for plain ground beef

A recipe, in the Complete Book of Home Preserving (ISBN 978-0-7788-0137-5). Page 399 carries Ground Beef, Lamb, Mutton, Pork, Veal or Venison — a variation of the boneless roast recipe that begins on page 398. Ground beef is the first meat in its title.

The variation ends by sending you back to the shared method: “Continue with Step 3, using a slotted spoon to pack hot meat into hot jars, then ladling boiling water, broth or tomato juice over meat.” Step 3 runs into step 4, at the top of page 399, which is where the times are:

“Vent steam for 10 minutes, then close vent. Continue heating to achieve 10 lbs (69 kPa) pressure. Process pint (250 mL) jars for 75 minutes and quart (500 mL) jars for 90 minutes.”

So, in Bernardin jar sizes:

Jar	Time at 10 lb
500 mL	75 minutes
1 L	90 minutes

Their website is a different catalogue, and it does not carry this. Searches for ground beef and meat on bernardin.ca return the general Poultry recipe; red meat there is specific dishes only — Beef in Wine Sauce, Beef Stew with Vegetables, Beef Stock, Quebec Pork Meatballs, Spare Ribs, Pork Tenderloin, Pork Sausage. The book covers more than the site does, and this is the clearest example we have found.

One misprint in that sentence — ignore the book’s metric, keep its times

Step 4 prints “pint (250 mL)” and “quart (500 mL)”. A pint jar is 500 mL and a quart jar is 1 L, and the book’s own page 10 prints an 8-ounce jar as 250 mL — so that one sentence has shifted every size down a step. The times are right; the metric in the brackets is wrong.

Which way does the error cut? Away from danger, as it happens — every bracketed size is one step too small, so a reader going by the metric alone over-processes rather than under-processes: they would give a 250 mL jar 75 minutes and a 500 mL jar 90. That is longer than needed, not shorter. The reason to ignore the brackets is that they are wrong and confusing, not that they are dangerous. Go by the jar in your hand: 500 mL gets 75 minutes, 1 L gets 90.

Meat Sauce is still a different recipe

Meat Sauce — 5 lb (2.3 kg) of lean ground beef or pork in a tomato base — is 60 minutes for 500 mL and 75 minutes for 1 L. Those are not the times above, and they should not be swapped for them: it is acidified with tomatoes, tomato paste and vinegar, and packs at a different density. A processing time is calculated against exactly those things.

The six meats, and the ones that are not on the list

Page 399’s title names beef, lamb, mutton, pork, veal and venison, ground. That is the tested scope.

Moose, elk, caribou and bison are named on neither page 398 nor page 399. A recipe that names six meats has not tested a seventh, so there is no time here for them and we will not borrow one. Freeze that meat, or follow a recipe written for it. Ground poultry is not on this list either — chicken has its own recipe with its own four times.

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Plain beef only — no binders

The single most important rule, after “pressure canner only”:

No breadcrumbs. No egg. No oats. No rice, flour, or filler of any kind.

Binders and fillers behave like thickeners in a canned stew — they pack into a dense mass that stops heat from reaching the centre of the jar within the processing time. The centre never hits kill temperature, and you’ve made a botulism risk. Can plain browned ground beef; turn it into meatloaf, meatballs, or a thickened sauce when you open the jar, adding the binder or thickener then, in the pot.

Drain the fat

Fat is the other enemy. During processing it migrates onto the jar rim and prevents a clean seal; over months of storage it can turn rancid and taint the beef. Two habits fix it:

• Use lean or medium ground beef, not regular. Less fat to drain, better storage.
• Drain thoroughly. Brown the beef fully, tip it into a colander, and let the grease run off before packing. Wipe every rim scrupulously clean of grease before applying lids.

What you need

For about 6 × 500 mL jars:

• 2.5 kg lean or medium ground beef — browned and drained
• 1 tbsp neutral oil for browning (only if the beef is very lean and sticks)
• Boiling beef broth or water — roughly 1–1.5 L, to cover
• 2 tsp pickling salt (non-iodized), split between jars — optional, for flavour only
• Optional dry seasoning per jar: ¼ tsp onion powder, a pinch of black pepper
• Bernardin 500 mL or 1 L jars — regular or wide-mouth
• Fresh SNAP lids and bands
• Pressure canner (see the pressure canner buying guide)
• Standard canning kit plus a large skillet and a colander

Method

Step 1: Brown and drain

1. Brown the ground beef in batches in a large hot skillet, breaking it into crumbles with a spoon. It must be cooked through — grey-brown all the way, not pink — because this is a hot-pack recipe.
2. Do not add any binder. No flour, no breadcrumbs, no egg.
3. Drain. Tip each batch into a colander set over a bowl and let the fat run off completely.

Step 2: Boil the packing liquid

1. In a separate pot, bring beef broth or water to a rolling boil. Keep it boiling until you pack.
2. Broth adds flavour; plain water is neutral and cheaper. Either is safe.

Step 3: Pack the jars

1. Have the pressure canner with 7–8 cm of hot water and the rack inside, lid off, gently simmering.
2. Have hot jars on the counter.
3. Pack the drained beef loosely into each hot jar — don’t compress it into a solid plug; heat has to move between the crumbles.
4. Add optional salt and dry seasoning to each jar.
5. Pour boiling broth or water over to cover the beef, leaving 2.5 cm (1 inch) headspace.
6. Run the headspace tool down the side to release air bubbles; top up liquid to keep 2.5 cm headspace.
7. Wipe rims with a clean damp cloth — twice if needed to remove every trace of grease.
8. Apply fresh SNAP lids fingertip-tight.

Step 4: Process

1. Lower jars into the canner. Water level 7–8 cm — not covering the jars.
2. Lock the lid. Heat on high.
3. Vent for 10 full minutes — a steady column of steam through the open vent. This is a mandatory safety step, not optional.
4. Apply the regulator. Bring to 10 PSI (or higher for your altitude — see below).
5. Start the timer when pressure is reached — 75 minutes for 500 mL jars, 90 minutes for 1 L, page 399. Go by the jar in your hand, not by the book’s bracketed metric; see the misprint above.
6. Maintain pressure by adjusting the heat. If pressure drops below 10 PSI at any point, bring it back up and restart the timer from the beginning. Don’t walk away.

Step 5: Cool and check

1. Turn off the heat at the end of the timer. Don’t move or open the canner.
2. Let it depressurize naturally — 45–60 minutes. Never force-cool with water or by cracking the lid.
3. At zero pressure, remove the weight, wait 2 minutes, then unlock the lid (tilt it away from your face).
4. Lift jars with the jar lifter without tilting them; cool 24 hours undisturbed on a towel, and don’t retighten the bands.
5. Check seals — the lid should be concave and immovable.
6. Wipe jars clean (broth often siphons during cooling) and label with the date.

If a jar doesn’t seal: the 24-hour rule applies. Bernardin publishes three endings for an unsealed jar of any product: reprocess it immediately, refrigerate it and use within a few days, or freeze it. No authority publishes a separate, shorter window for low-acid food, so take the short end of those few days rather than the long end.

Altitude adjustments

Altitude	Weighted gauge	Dial gauge
0 – 305 m	10 PSI	11 PSI
306 – 609 m	15 PSI	11 PSI
610 – 1,219 m	15 PSI	12 PSI
1,220 – 1,828 m	15 PSI	13 PSI
1,829 – 2,438 m	15 PSI	14 PSI
2,439 – 3,048 m	15 PSI	15 PSI

Whatever time your tested recipe gives, altitude changes the PSI, not the minutes. Check your elevation against the table above — above 305 m the gauge goes up, and Calgary (~1,084 m) and Banff (~1,383 m) need a higher gauge than Vancouver or Halifax. See the full Canadian-city altitude table.

Storage and serving

• Cool, dark, dry place at room temperature
• Best quality 12 months — Bernardin’s guidance is to use home-canned food within one year. That is a quality window, not an expiry: the jar is as safe as the process made it. Colour, flavour and texture fade.
• After opening: refrigerate, use within one week (HealthLink BC)
• Inspect every jar before opening — a bulging lid means discard immediately, without opening or tasting

Corrected 20 September 2026: this page previously gave an after-opening window of 3–4 days, a shorter figure specific to this food that no authority we could find publishes. HealthLink BC File #22 publishes one week for any opened home-canned container — “Once the container has been opened, refrigerate leftovers, and use within one week.” This correction makes the window longer rather than shorter: anyone who discarded a jar at 3–4 days was going by a number we had no source for. The shelf life of the sealed jar is unchanged.

What to make with a jar

• Tacos or nachos — drain, warm with taco seasoning
• Chili or pasta sauce — tip the jar (liquid included) into simmering sauce
• Shepherd’s pie — the filling is already cooked; thicken in the pot and top with mash
• Skillet hash — brown with diced potato and onion

A 500 mL jar is roughly 375 g of cooked beef — enough for two generous servings.

Common problems

• Fat layer or grease on the seal. Almost always under-draining or an un-wiped rim. Drain harder and wipe rims twice next batch.
• Beef packed into a solid plug. Pack loosely — compressed meat blocks heat penetration. Crumble as you fill.
• Liquid siphoned during processing (jar partly empty). Common with meat. Siphoning does not change whether the jar was processed according to current home canning recommendations, and that is the condition Bernardin’s clearance rests on — not the liquid level. See why jars lose liquid. The exposed beef may darken slightly.
• Cloudy or fatty broth. Normal from beef collagen and residual fat. Safe.
• Jar didn’t seal. The 24-hour rule. Bernardin says reprocess immediately, refrigerate and use within a few days, or freeze — take the short end of those few days for a low-acid meat.
• Bulging lid weeks or months later. Discard immediately without opening or tasting. Bulging in pressure-canned meat is a clear botulism warning. See our discard protocol.

Why home-canned ground beef is worth it

• Ten-minute dinners from a shelf-stable jar — no freezer, no thawing
• Buy the sale — can a batch when ground beef is marked down before its date
• Frees the freezer for produce and bread
• You control the ingredients — no fillers, salt to taste
• Hunter and homesteader staple — ground venison is in the same tested recipe as the beef; see below

Ground game meat

All of them are low-acid, so all of them are pressure-canning-only. Past that they are not in one position.

Ground venison takes the times on this page — 75 minutes for 500 mL, 90 for 1 L, at 10 lb. Venison is named in page 399’s own title, so it is inside the tested recipe rather than an extension of one, and everything above applies to it unchanged.

Moose and elk are named on neither page 398 nor page 399, so there is no tested recipe for them and nothing for us to point you at. Freeze that meat, or follow a recipe written for it.

Wild game is very lean either way, so add a little neutral oil when browning to keep it from sticking, and drain as usual.

Next steps

• Best pressure canner in Canada — Presto vs All American — the one purchase you can’t substitute
• How to pressure can beef stew — a full meal in a jar
• How to pressure can chicken — companion protein
• Pressure canning pillar — the full method and science
• Canning altitude adjustments — required reading
• How to tell if canned food has gone bad — botulism awareness
• SNAP lid reuse rules — fresh lids every batch