Can I Use Plastic Bottles For Canning?-Home canning guide

Plastic bottles for canning

Today, home canning has become more widespread than ever. Home canning is a technique used to preserve food so that it lasts longer without losing its taste and nutrition. Home canning can be beneficial and timesaving, but it may cause severe complications if not performed the right way. In this blog post, you’ll get to know whether to use plastic bottles for canning.  Keep diving and learning! 

Further Reading: The Rules You Should Know

Can we use Plastic Bottles for Canning?

No! You cannot use a plastic bottle for canning. To understand the reason, one must comprehend the mechanism of canning.

Canning involves keeping food in airtight containers, mostly jars, heating the containers at a sufficiently high temperature to kill all the germs in the food, and then closing the airtight jar’s lid. It creates a semi-vacuum as air cannot enter or exit the container. Bacteria need oxygen gas for their activity, which is not available in the container, and the pre-existing bacteria have been wiped off. As a result, bacteria can not develop in the food. In this way, we can preserve food without a refrigerator.

Now, coming back to the question, can we use plastic bottles for home canning? As mentioned above, we cannot use plastic bottles for this purpose. Following are some reasons:-

1. No Vacuum:

We cannot create a vacuum in an ordinary plastic bottle. As a result, bacteria can grow in the food and spoil it.

2. Low Melting Point:

Companies don’t make most plastic bottles for home canning. Home canning needs extensive heating. There is always a risk factor that the bottle may melt or become soft. It can ruin the food.

3. Loose Lid:

Even if a plastic bottle has an airtight lid, chances are there that lid might become loose because of heat and other environmental conditions. It is always advisable to use a glass jar.

Complications of Adopting Wrong Home Canning Methods

• Do not opt for cheaper options like using plastic bottles for home canning. If your home canning fails, it leads to botulism. Botulism is a lethal disease caused by the bacteria Clostridium botulinum. 
• Food spoils unevenly faster that ultimately causes wastage of food.