"Canned" Chicken

I know it looks disgusting, but don't write it off yet... there is a reason that canned meat at the store is sold in opaque cans and not jars...it actually is quite tasty.

In our relief society a couple of months ago, they had a class about canning chicken. At first I wasn't interested in trying to do this....why would I want to spend a bunch of time canning something that I would never use? I have my years supply of many foods, but I would like to have some additional foods in there that I will actually eat that are not wheat or bean based. I also want to add in foods that I will rotate through... I don't see the point in storing a bunch of foods so that when they expire I can throw them away and buy some more foods to throw away especially of the expensive foods. My mom did a class in her relief society and I got to try some of her meat. It tasted good, not so different than any cooked chicken, basically bland but easily seasoned. As I continued to think about it, I thought of many times that I could use canned chicken, in fact, on a day to day basis it could actually make my life easier... instead of thawing out chicken and then cooking it to use, I can just open a jar of chicken, and use it in whatever recipe I want to use. Yesterday, I actually went ahead and made my own. It was surprisingly easy to do....just takes a lot of time for you to wait for it to cook, but you can be doing other things at the same time. First of all, you need a pressure canner. Mine looks like this: but you can buy a cheaper one on amazon.

T

hen you just follow the instructions as told by Wendy Dewitt on her blog. Its under the entry from Wednesday, November 12, 2008 for everything under the sun and then under the canned meats section.

Once you are done canning you can use your chicken in many recipes. Things that I would use canned chicken in are: soups, salads,your favorite kind of enchiladas, casseroles, pot pie or chili. You can also cut it up and fry it with cumin, chili powder and lots of lime juice and use it for tacos or fajitas or taco salad. (The lime juice makes it taste like fajitas from Lupe Tortilla). You could also cut it up and saute it with onions and green peppers and put it on a sandwich roll with cheese melted on top. You could use it in pastas: saute with chicken broth and white wine, add tomatoes and any other veggies you like and possible melt swiss or Parmesan cheese on top over linguine. (Joe says I make too many things with meat, cheese and bread...but I think you can never add too much cheese). Apparently, you can do the same thing with pork loin and even make the pork loin like they use on Cafe Rio (in Utah if you've never been there you are missing out). I haven't tried that yet, I'll have to try it sometime and get back to you.

Does anyone else have any good recipes they can use this chicken for?