#edit: 2 weeks later i have potentially found a pair with a 1/6 chance to replace this one WE'RE SO BACK

[torrentialgoat-fr]

Person hosting breeding project dragond seems to be inactive

[marjansmarwani]

we won the cosmic lottery

2.1k || ao3

When Mya convinces Carlos to try speed dating on what would otherwise be a lonely Valentine’s Day, he’s pretty sure it’s going to be a disaster. Until a man who manages to light up his world with one look slides into the seat before him, that is. Suddenly he’s feeling a lot more optimistic.

Or, Tarlos Alternate First Meeting: Speed Dating Edition

I wrote fluff again and I am probably more surprised than you are. 

But I found this prompt from @madamewriterofwrongs in my inbox from several months ago and figured why not write a Valentine’s Day fic and try to stretch those fluff muscles again. Beta’d by @officereyes 💕 

-----------

As bad ideas went, Carlos was pretty sure this was one. 

“I cannot believe I let you talk me into this.” 

“What, you had other hot plans for Valentine’s Day?” Mya asked him, raising a skeptical eyebrow at him over her drink. 

“No,” Carlos admitted, “but that doesn’t mean this was the correct alternative.” 

“Why not? You’ll waste an hour of your life, talk to some people, come out with some good stories if nothing else. I think it sounds like the perfect alternative to spending the night home alone with Netflix.” 

“Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it,” he told her, tipping his glass to her before taking another drink.

“I have tried it Carlos, far too many times. You have too - that’s why we’re here.” 

“To get a look at Austin’s future serial killers?” 

Mya rolled her eyes at him before lightly smacking his arm with her clutch, “No, Officer Buzzkill. We’re here for a chance to maybe meet Mr. or Ms. Right.” 

Carlos twisted on his stool to survey the crowd gathered in the reserved section of the bar. He typically didn’t like to make assumptions without at least trying to get to know someone first, but he could honestly say that none of the men in the crowd even gave him the slightest glimmer of hope for the evening. He should have stayed home. 

He turned back to Mya with a dubious expression and she rolled her eyes again, “Lighten up Carlos, at the very least it can’t hurt.”

Carlos cast a glance back to one guy who was leering at him from the other side of the room and grimaced, “I’m not too sure about that.” 

His partner opened her mouth to respond but was interrupted by someone grabbing a microphone and calling the crowd to attention. 

“Good evening lonely hearts!” the host said once the din of the crowd had died down. Carlos shot Mya a look but she ignored him. 

“We’re going to get started here in a few minutes,” the host continued, “but before we start moving I just wanted to go over the specifics. Upon checking in you were given a bracelet. These are to help with the logistics. If you received a red bracelet you will be taking a seat at any of the open tables. If you got a pink one you will be rotating between the tables.”

Carlos glanced down at his wrist to see a red bracelet sitting there. Mya held up her own wrist to show another red one, “Looks like we both get to have people come to us tonight.” 

Carlos chuckled at her before turning his attention back to the host, who was still explaining the rules. 

“When the bell dings, you will rotate to the table to your right. You will have 3 minutes with each potential suitor and when the bell rings, you will move to the next one. Make sure that you write down their number and check yes or no before you part on the card provided - that’s how we will be pairing you! At the end of the evening we will be comparing all the lists and you will receive a list of the names and contact info of any suitors you mutually matched with to the email provided. After that, the ball is in your court! So make sure you make the most of these three minutes; it could be the time you find your soulmate!” 

The room filled with polite clapping and Carlos turned again to Mya, “You can’t be serious.” 

“Lighten up Reyes,” she said with a wink, “you wouldn’t want to scare your potential soulmate away.” 

“Fine, I’ll ‘lighten up’. But if one of these creeps murders me to make a skin suit, I’m holding you personally responsible.” 

“I don’t believe in ghosts so your threats have no effect on me.” 

There were several more things he wanted to say to his partner, but he was interrupted by the sound of the host telling them all to head to their respective areas. As they went to stand up, Mya reached out to touch his arm, “it’s going to be fine Carlos, really. You’ve got this; try to have some fun for once.” 

Her tone and expression were much more gentle than before and he took a deep breath, forcing himself to relax, “Thanks Mya,” he replied with a grateful smile. “Now go find Ms. Right.” 

She matched his smile and with a wave, she was gone. Carlos took another steady breath and headed to the guy’s section of the room, taking a seat at one of the tables. He pulled the card out of his jacket pocket and picked up one of the pencils waiting on the table, twirling it through his fingers anxiously. And when the first contender of the night slid into the seat before him he forced on a warm smile and held out his hand in greeting. Mya was right, he had this. 

--------

7 dates later he was less sure he had this. 

They hadn’t all been creeps, per se (though numbers 2 and 6 definitely had been) but they also hadn’t done anything to elicit any kind of spark in Carlos. They had been nice enough and reasonably good looking, but Carlos had decided a long time ago that good enough wasn’t worth the effort. If he was going to try and make a go of something with someone, they had to be someone who made him feel something. It had to be worth the risk. 

He was contemplating his abysmal luck when the next guy slid into the chair across from him. Carlos looked up and all coherent thoughts fled his head. This guy was... gorgeous was the only word Carlos could come up with that did him justice. Everything about him was perfect and Carlos couldn’t bring himself to look away. 

He eventually noticed the extended hand in what he sincerely hoped was a normal amount of time and took it, still studying him as he blurted out the first thought that came to mind: “I didn’t see you here before.” 

He definitely hadn’t been here when things were starting, Carlos would have noticed him in a crowd, he was absolutely sure about that. The other man smiled sheepishly, “yeah, I got here a bit late. I was trying to convince myself to actually come. My friends had to practically push me in the door.” 

Carlos chuckled, “My friend had to pretty much drag me here with her. Are your friends here?” 

“They’re at a bar down the street for ‘moral support’,” he responded with an eye roll, but a fond expression. 

“That’s so helpful.” 

“Isn’t it?” 

They both laughed again before Carlos suddenly realized they had yet to even exchange names, “I’m Carlos, by the way.” 

“TK, nice to meet you.” 

“That’s an interesting name. Does it stand for something?” 

TK grinned at him coyly, “It does, but that’s at least a level 4 backstory, and we’re barely at level one.” 

Carlos grinned back, feeling the quip come easily despite the butterflies definitely fluttering in his stomach, “Well, we’ve got some time to work on that. Personally though I recommend we skip over levels 1 and 2, those are mundane at best.” 

TK’s green eyes lit up as he laughed. The sound sent a shock through Carlos’s entire body and in that moment, Carlos decided he had been wrong. He owed Mya an apology: this had been an excellent idea after all. 

-----

His three minutes with TK had not been nearly long enough. When the bell had dinged he had nearly jumped out of his skin. He had been so absorbed in their conversation he hadn't noticed the passage of time. It felt like they had been talking all night, but also as if they had barely begun to talk at all. 

TK gave him an apologetic smile as he stood from his chair, “I guess that’s my cue. It was really nice talking to you though, Carlos.”

“Yeah, you too,” he responded. He hesitated for a moment as he studied the other man. In only three minutes he had felt more of a connection with TK than he had with people he had dated for weeks. Maybe it was that they were both first responders, maybe it was something else, but he wasn’t ready to let this go. So many things were mysteries, but Carlos knew one thing for sure: if he let TK walk away from him tonight, he might just end up regretting it for the rest of his life. 

“Would you maybe like to catch up when we’re done here? Maybe get a drink, talk some more?” 

TK paused mid-stride, raising an eyebrow, “You still have two more dates left, how do you know you won’t want to spend the evening with them instead?” 

“Call it intuition.” 

He could call it intuition or blind hope or desperation if he wanted, Carlos really didn’t care. He just knew in his gut that it was right, that TK was someone he needed to get to know more. TK was still considering him, and Carlos anxiously awaited his verdict. This was so far outside of his comfort zone and he was pretty sure that if TK turned him down he was going to head back to his condo tonight and not leave for at least two days, too buried in embarrassment and shame to face the outside world. But this felt worth the risk; he just hoped he hadn’t read these feelings wrong. 

Finally, after what felt like a lifetime passing in the moment of a breath, TK smiled. “I’d like that,” he said, “I guess bachelors 9 and 10 are out of luck for both of us then.” 

“Try to let them down easy.” 

TK laughed again, squeezing his shoulder as he walked away, “As long as you promise to do the same—getting turned down by you would be a tough pill to swallow, Carlos. Try to break their hearts gently.”  

-------

Carlos was still feeling the euphoria of TK’s smile 10 minutes later when a figure slid into the seat next to him at the bar. He turned eagerly, ready to see TK’s eyes again and felt disappointment, followed by instant guilt, when it wasn’t TK but Mya occupying the seat next to him. 

“Well that was a waste of time,” she declared as she slumped forward onto the bar, “you were right. I shouldn’t have dragged you here, I’m sorry. Wanna go get tacos at that truck you love to drown our sorrows?” 

“Actually,” Carlos began, but their conversation was interrupted by the sound of someone calling his same from behind them. They turned in tandem and Carlos felt his heart beat just a little faster at the sight of TK, who was looking between him and Mya. 

“Hey Carlos, I just wanted to see if you were ready for that drink yet. If you’re not we can...” 

Mya interrupted before TK could finish his sentence, “I was just leaving, actually. I’m Mya, by the way—Carlos’s partner and friend.” 

TK turned his gorgeous smile on her and held out a hand, “TK Strand, nice to meet you.” 

“TK’s a firefighter,” Carlos told Mya, biting back a smile as she raised an eyebrow and TK nodded, “I’m with the 126.”

“Well, TK Strand with the 126, take good care of my partner here. He’s pretty special.” 

“I’ve already gotten that feeling,” TK agreed, giving Carlos another grin that he felt straight through to his soul. 

Mya smirked as she stood from her seat, looking between them as she pulled out her keys, “I’d say have a good rest of the night, but I think that’s already a given. I’ll see you on Monday Carlos, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

“And that would be what, exactly?” 

Mya shrugged as she started to walk away, “I’m sure I’ll think of something.” 

“Text me when you get home!” he called after her. 

“Yes mom!” she called back as she reached the door. Before she opened it to head out into the Austin night she turned one more time and shot him a smile and a thumbs up. He rolled his eyes fondly, but nodded. Then she was gone and he turned all of his attention to the man beside him. He was grinning too and Carlos was starting to get the feeling that he might never get used to the things that smile did to him.  

TK slid into Mya’s abandoned seat and leaned closer to him, “So where do we start?” 

Carlos smiled back and waved down the bartender to get drinks for them. He wasn’t sure where to begin, but he had a feeling wherever it was would be the beginning of something great. He turned and caught TK’s eyes again, savoring the warmth that emanated from them. 

Tonight may have started out feeling like a mistake, but he was starting to think it may have actually been more like fate. 

[koishia-blog]

So many ded games...

So for many people that has been around the moba community in the last weeks you’ll know it hasn’t been a very good time due to 2 of the mobas that, at least for me, had a great potential, closing in the following months: Paragon and Gigantic.

I wasn’t very invested in Paragon to be honest, but I really really liked Gigantic. The thing is I wanted to be a person that supported games that I felt had potential and, in part my idea of making youtube videos would be to do reviews of these lesser known mobas to raise awareness since these games were closed because their respective publishers pulled the plug due to a lack of a player base. I know, I know that I’m a new blog and barely anyone knows of my existence but everybody starts somewhere.

Anyway, I’m giving up on the youtube idea, after seeing so many games with potential, that I like, and feel like they deserve the effort not being able to make it to full release or being closed 4-6 months after their release. I don’t think I should put the effort into learning how to make videos, recording and editing things that are going to become irrelevant in less than a year.

In fact, I’m getting burned out of the moba genre lately, I don’t feel like playing the mainstream ones and I don’t feel like investing time in the small ones due to these previous reasons so that’s why I’m thinking of jumping straight into streaming. I have been running some tests lately, in fact, but more on that later on a new post.

For now, I want to write a memorial and pay respects (F) to these mobas that could have been great but publishers didn’t give them a chance

Dawngate

First we have Dawngate, a game developed by Waystone Games and published by EA, I mean, just seeing the publisher’s name already doomed them.

I remember finding this game by pure chance and seeing that the character design was interesting, and that they even had an artist support!

So I went to download it only to find that the servers were closing on that same day. Okaaay...

I went onto learn more about the game and everybody looked so crushed about it closing and they had so much praise for the game that made me feel sad that I couldn’t try it, but hey! I guess EA wanted to make a LoL killer and since this game couldn’t pull millions of players during beta they decided it wasn’t even worth trying. However, there seems to be some people trying to revive it so it’s something. We’ll see if EA allows it once they manage to release their own version.

Master x Master

Developed and published by NCSoft, Master x Master (MXM) was their attempt at doing a moba like Blizzard did with Heroes of the Storm, by grabbing characters from their other games along with some new ones.

While it’s true that I had some nostalgia feelings, especially with Kat the Cat as I was a human warlock back when I played Lineage 2, they can’t compare with characters created by Blizzard, characters that have been part of most gamers’ life while they grew up and that they’re even still relevant now.

Now the game itself had some interesting features. To start with, it was a mix of pve mmo and pvp and its main feature was that you chose 2 characters and could switch between them strategically to keep yourself alive. Pair a DPS assassin with a tank, for example, and you could deal damage to others then switch to tank if things went rough.

But of course, NCSoft had to get greedy, for a game that needed not one but 2 characters to play the game, and even more if you wanted to stay competitive, the price of them was very high. If you didn’t want to spend real money the only ways to obtain SOL (the ingame currency to buy characters) were: To level up your account, which gave 1 SOL per level, that being more and more difficult as your level was higher. Pve missions on the highest difficulty that had a chance of giving 1 SOL as a reward (but cost 1 SOL to go in) and login events. With most characters costing 7 or more SOL, along with the unstability of the servers and lag, led the community to complain and eventually start leaving the game. NCSoft didn’t do anything to fix their problems and 4 months after launch they decided to shut down the game and invest large quantities of money into paying Twitch streamers to promote their new Lineage 2 version for phones.

Paragon

As I said I don’t know much about Paragon. I played a bit against bots and that’s it, but I did read a bit on what happened to it and how it ended up dying.

Paragon, developed and published by Epic Games and released in 2016 was a take on a 3rd person moba, similar to Smite but with amazing realistic graphics. The map, designed to take advance of verticality made up for interesting gameplay compared to Smite, but also, said map design made for very long games (40 minutes average). In a time where people wanted to spend less time playing a match, and mobas like Heroes of the Storm were doing very well with their 20 minute average matches, Epic tried very hard to reduce the time of their matches, which led to a change of the map that the more hardcore part of the gamer base, that came from other long time match mobas such as LoL or Dota, didn’t like.

New players found the game very difficult to get into, especially its card system, and getting matched with and against a player base of hardcore gamers was very rough. At the same time, the attempts of Epic to make the game more casual for these new players angered the hardcore player base as it led the game to become more of a brawl than an strategic moba with, for example, towers not being a threat at all and becoming totally pointless. In short, Epic was trying to appease to a small amount of new players that weren’t staying, while not hearing the complains from their loyal veteran ones.

Eventually, Epic released Fortnite, a pve tower defense game that didn’t do very well until they decided to turn it into a battle royale and make it free, unlike Player Unknown Battlegrounds, another battle royale that was one of the most successful games at the moment. The incredible success of Fortnite made Epic start to shift the team of Paragon towards Fortnite, as Paragon wasn’t getting any revenue while Fortnite was getting plenty.

Epic, unable to keep changing a game in attempts to make everyone happy and the fact that their new game was making them rich, decided it was time to let the “old” Paragon game rest in peace and focus all the efforts on Fortnite. Only time will tell if betting everything on Fortnite is a good idea or if it will die once the battle royale trend ends.

Gigantic

To me, Gigantic is the saddest story of them all, and it hurts me deeply to see it go. The art style, the character design, the tiny bits of lore, the gameplay, the smoothnes and funny animations were amazing. As someone that can’t get into Overwatch, since I don’t like the first person view in competitive games, Gigantic was perfect. So what went wrong with a game that had so many good things? Everything.

Gigantic was developed by Motiga, a small indie studio. Wanting to make the game something big they looked for investors and made a deal with Microsoft. Microsoft just released Windows 10 and took Gigantic as one of their exclusive release games. Most gamers interested during that time forgot about Gigantic since they didn’t own an Xbox or didn’t want to change to Windows 10 (myself included) which reduced the potential player base by a lot.

Eventually, they could drop the Microsoft deal and got Perfect World Entertainment (PWE) as their new publisher, which opened the game for all PC gamers and not only those with Windows 10, even though the 6 GB minimum of RAM required made a lot of interested players unable to play.

The game had almost no advertisement during launch, most of the people that could have been interested didn’t get into the game thinking it still was a Microsoft and Windows 10 exclusive. There was also bugs and features that Motiga’s developers, still a relatively small studio, couldn’t solve, as well as not being able to reduce the RAM requirements to 4 GB to open accessibility to more players. Motiga started becoming smaller and smaller until they sold the game completely to PWE. PWE did nothing to promote, advertise or support their newly acquired game and only kept a handful of developers to sustain it. 2 months after acquiring Gigantic they announced they were closing it.

A game with truly a lot of potential, dying because of a greedy publisher that did nothing to advertise it and a small studio that couldn’t solve the technical issues and bugs that the game had.

While there are many mobas around I don’t find anything close to what Gigantic was. It makes me sad just to think I won’t be able to play anymore characters like Pakko, a cute and playful giant,

 or Aisling, a little girl that summoned the ghost of her father to fight along her, to name a couple favourites of mine.

Also the fact that, unlike most mobas, where you defend a nexus or core that is just a structure, on Gigantic you defended a guardian that was either a giant griffon or a serpent, and seeing them flying over the battleground during the match and attack each other during rampage mode always gave me the chills.

Goodbye Gigantic...I wish you would have lasted long enough for me to be able to play with my boyfriend that couldn’t play because of the RAM requirements...

Special mention: Hyper Universe

This game is not dead yet but after all these disappointments I can see the signs leading into it.

Hyper Universe is being published by Nexon, a company with a very bad reputation and known for dropping other games, so to start with, that’s not good.

The game was released as a paid early access on autumn 2017. The player base was very small, as not many people wanted to pay for early access on a really not well known game. Sure, that access included a pack of heroes and their respective equipment but people were hesitant to spend money on a moba that’s going to be free to play in the future and with lots of negative reviews due to the censorship.

Ah...the censorship, that alone would make for pages of discussion but I’m going to keep it simple. Hyper Universe has a very sexualized female design on most of their characters so the Korean branch, worried about how the western audience would take it, they censored the splash art of most females and got rid of the jiggle physics in game. As for how bad the censorship is? Judge yourselves:

Yeah...The thing is that no one didn’t even notice the censorship until someone pointed it out and then a storm of complaints started with people demanding to go back to the original art, thing that Nexon didn’t want to and in fact, “censored” the Korean version of the game as well so no one could say that there was differences between both versions.

What I think about all this? An awful PR move, the censorship is so meaningless they might as well have kept the original art in and avoided all the negative reviews and players leaving because “the company doesn’t listen to what the community wants”, and if someone was offended by the non-censored version they were still going to be offended by the censored one. Personally, I like the censored version better as it seems slightly more realistic but that’s personal preference. What I really look for in a game is its gameplay even though character design, as someone that likes art, matters a lot. It’s true that a game that is centered on making all women sexy doesn’t tell me much but I can say that the art itself, as in technique and beauty appeal is great. Anyway enough of that, let’s move into the gameplay.

The gameplay is a 2D side scrolling moba, even though they want to call it “action brawler” where you have a base, several towers, minions, and a jungle. Its defining factor is that the map is vertical and you move through lanes and the jungle by using ladders. The controls are very similar to a fighting game and can be played by using a controller as well.

Overall, innovative gameplay and ideas in a game that’s going to die because the publisher is going to shut it down due to a lack of player base. With an average of 20 people online during early access, 2 thousand people when it became free to play on January 17th 2018 and less than 1 thousand nowadays, it’s going to be a matter of time when Nexon decides it’s not profitable anymore. I wish I was wrong, but I’ve seen this pattern too many times, and the fact that they’ve started firing a lot of employees that were in charge of the community isn’t a good sign either.

So here you go, my opinion of all these dead (almost dead) games, and how I’m more and more disappointed about the videogame, or online videogame industry in general. Maybe I got some facts wrong or not entirely right, if you want to discuss about it you can do so with replies, or send messages to my inbox which, if I’m not mistaken, should be opened to everybody.

See ya!

[sweetseda]

8 Canning Tips and Tricks for Modern-Day Home Canning | Garden Betty

At some point in your homemaking journey — whether you’re a cook, gardener, or full-blown homesteader — you’ve probably learned how to preserve food. And for many people, boiling water bath canning is the gateway to all other food preserving.

Though it requires more gear in the kitchen than, say, mason jar fermenting or oven dehydrating, there’s something about canning a batch of tomatoes, jams, or pickles that’s deeply satisfying.

Maybe it speaks to our off-grid fantasies of being a self-sufficient mountain mama (or mountain man). Maybe it’s because the distinctive pop of the lids brings a sense of accomplishment and joy, or the fact that we end up giving some of those jars away as gifts that brings even greater joy.

I learned how to preserve food just a couple months into tending an edible garden (before I learned how much I actually needed to grow to feed my family). That first summer, I canned 24 jars of tomatoes and 40 jars of jams and jellies. (These feijoa-white peach preserves were one of my first batches in the kitchen, and the first canning recipe I ever posted on my blog. Wild, eh?)

Almost a decade later, I’ve learned some useful tips and tricks for modern-day home canning, and even picked up a few time-saving habits as an ambassador for Ball Canning, America’s favorite mason jars.

Learn from these little nuggets of information I’ve gleaned from their test kitchen, as well as from my own experiences (hundreds of jars later!).

1. You don’t need to warm your lids ahead of time.

I first heard this from the Ball Canning test kitchen a few years ago, and I was floored.

I’ve come across countless canning recipes that tell you to preheat the lids in simmering water before using (to soften the sealing compound for better adhesion), and even Ball’s previous product packaging and older editions of their canning book have recommended preheating lids.

However — straight from the source — this is no longer necessary for Ball or Kerr brand lids.

After comprehensive testing by our Quality Assurance Team, it was determined that it is completely safe to skip pre-warming lids in the canning process. While it is still safe to simmer your lids before use, you should never boil them. Our recommendation (for over 40 years) has always been to simmer (180°F) – but not boil (212°F) – the lids.

So, as far as lid prep goes, all that’s needed is a soapy wash in warm water. Done!

2. You don’t need to sterilize canning jars that will process for 10 minutes or more.

Again, mind blown when I learned this.

Many recipes call for jars to be sterilized before canning, a slightly annoying step that involves either submerging the jars in boiling water for 10 minutes (at altitudes of less than 1,000 feet) or remembering to sanitize them in the dishwasher right before you start.

But, good news! According to the National Center for Home Food Preservation, the go-to authority for all things canning, you do not need to sterilize jars if your processing time is 10 minutes or longer (at or below 1,000 feet elevation).

When the process time for canning a food is 10 minutes or more (at 0-1,000 feet elevation), the jars will be sterilized DURING processing in the canner. Therefore, when process times are 10 minutes or more at this altitude, pre-sterilization of jars is not needed. It doesn’t hurt your product to do it anyway, but it does require additional time and energy and is unnecessary.

Many canning recipes, with the exception of certain jams and jellies, already require at least 10 minutes in a boiling water bath, so there’s no need to sterilize these jars ahead of time.

For jellies that call for 5 minutes of processing time, there’s usually no harm in increasing that time to 10 minutes so you can skip the sterilization.

Note that the 10-minute rule applies to those living at or near sea level, so you will need to adjust that time accordingly if you live above 1,000 feet, per HFP.

If you are processing above 1,000 feet elevation, then you need to consider the altitude adjustments needed to sterilize jars so you use the equivalent to 10 minutes of boiling at 0-1,000 feet elevation.

Note that sterilizing is not the same as cleaning — you should always wash your jars thoroughly in soapy water before using. This was a fact that Ball emphasized when I toured their factory in Indiana, as the jars are made in an industrial environment that produces dust and other manufacturing residue.

3. Frozen fruits make excellent jams and preserves.

In the summer, there’s often a lot of pressure that comes with preserving large amounts of fresh, ripe fruits from your garden, especially if you think preserving always means canning “in season” and right now.

But here’s a secret: You can make delicious jams and preserves with frozen fruit, and no one will be the wiser!

Realizing this simple fact has since saved me from stressing over abundant harvests that I couldn’t keep up with in the kitchen. If I knew there was no way I’d be able to preserve my bounty of fruits within the week (including tomatoes, if their intended final use will be for tomato sauce), I spread them out across a baking sheet and put them in the freezer for a couple hours. (Doing this first keeps the fruits from clumping together in a bag.)

Once they’re solid, I collect them into freezer bags and come back to them when life is a little less chaotic and the weather turns cooler.

Another tip: You can make jam with store-bought frozen fruit as well! So if you’re craving homemade blueberry jam in the middle of winter, this is a great way to go.

4. Chopsticks make great bubbling tools.

Bubbling refers to releasing trapped air bubbles in a jar before sealing it with a lid and band. It’s an important step in boiling water bath canning, as not removing air bubbles can lead to seal failures.

You can bubble your jars with any narrow utensil, and in my canning recipes, I often recommend using a chopstick because it’s the perfect profile and material for the job: long, thin, and usually wood or plastic.

However, I’ve had readers in the past ask for alternatives because they didn’t have chopsticks, and in a pinch, I suggested a butter knife could work if they were very careful using it.

Knives and other metal utensils aren’t ideal because they could potentially etch the glass or cause hairline cracks, thus increasing the chances of jar breakage during processing.

I love the official “bubble freer” that Ball makes specifically for this task, plus it doubles as a handy tool for measuring headspace. (You can see it in action in this recipe.)

But, if you don’t want to buy another kitchen utensil, look in your junk drawer. Are there any disposable chopsticks lingering in there from your last Chinese takeout?

These wooden chopsticks are typically too flimsy for everyday meals and tend to gather dust in the back of my drawer, but they make great bubbling tools. Rather than throwing them out the next time you end up with a few pairs, set them aside for canning purposes.

5. An electric water bath canner can save space in the kitchen and save your glass cooktop, too.

Canning sessions at home used to mean taking over the kitchen for a whole afternoon, so no one else could be in there at the same time as me.

The kitchen counter would be crowded with jars and flavorings, dirty measuring cups and bowls would clutter the sink, and a behemoth of a canning pot would take up the entire stove, even though it only used one burner.

I never liked how the boiling water bath would steam up the kitchen on the hottest of days, and sometimes for multiple days if I had a lot of canning to do.

Then I discovered this electric water bath canner (while shooting a recipe demo in the Ball test kitchen) and it has changed my entire canning process for the better!

Now, I can move the cumbersome part of canning (the boiling water bath) to the dining table or even outside on the patio, as long as I can reach an outlet. It’s freed up space in my kitchen so my husband can get in there and fix a snack without feeling like he’s in my way, and it lets me relax a little, as I don’t have to rush to clear the stove in time for dinner-making.

Let me tell you that canning outdoors is so much more enjoyable on those beautiful summer days when you can take in some fresh air and sunshine and not feel stuck inside, hovering over your stove.

My electric water bath canner also functions as a massive pot for making soup stock (again, so helpful if you can move what’s sometimes an all-day endeavor away from the kitchen) and keeping party-sized beverages, such as mulled cider, nice and hot.

There’s a spigot on the side for dispensing liquid, which also means you don’t need to lift a heavy pot full of water to empty it.

An electric water bath canner is a great solution if you have a smooth (glass or ceramic) cooktop where you’re worried about scratching the surface, or the manufacturer advises against placing a canning pot on it.

As an alternative — especially if you like the idea of canning outside (or at least out of the kitchen) — you can get an induction burner and induction-compatible canning pot to use as a portable canning station.

The upside to going the induction route is how quickly you can get the water up to temperature for a boiling water bath (usually in half the time!). And, the technology itself won’t heat up your entire kitchen while you’re canning.

6. No canning pot? No problem! Use a stockpot with a cooling rack.

I originally started canning with one of those ubiquitous enamel canning pots, and while it wasn’t bad, it wasn’t great. The interior rack it came with was flimsy, the enamel was prone to denting, chipping, and rusting, and because of all these issues, the pot wasn’t really suitable for heavy-duty, general kitchen tasks.

I later found that using a large stainless steel stockpot with a round cooling rack that fits on the bottom was a much better option. I could use the stockpot for actual cooking (seafood boils, bone broth, and the like) and reuse the cooling rack for its intended purpose (as well as for steaming or holding hot items as a trivet).

This was before I got an electric water bath canner (see my previous tip), and while I primarily use that canner now, the stockpot still has a place in my kitchen because it’s so durable.

7. Don’t store your processed jars with the bands on.

The bands (canning rings) are meant to hold the lids in place during processing (and again when you open the jar). Once the jars have cooled and the lids are sealed, you should unscrew the bands, rinse, dry, and store them. (I corral all of mine in a basket near my other canning supplies.)

Doing so will not only keep the bands from corroding onto the lids and making them hard to get off (it happens, especially if you don’t get to the jars for a while), it’ll extend their useful life because they won’t rust as quickly.

You can reuse those same bands for the next round of canning without needing to buy more. Unlike the lids, which are one-time use only (as far as canning goes), the bands can be used over and over again until they rust or become damaged.

(If you find yourself canning frequently, you might want to consider replacement canning rings, which are made of thick stainless steel that should resist rusting and warping.)

Another reason I recommend removing the bands is to ensure you have a good seal on the jar. If there were problems during processing, you’ll know because gases from bacteria and spoilage will break the seal on the lid. If a band is holding that lid in place, you might not find out for weeks or months (when you’re looking for the jar).

As long as the boiling water bath created a good vacuum seal on the lids, unscrewing the bands after processing will not cause your jars to unseal.

8. Properly canned foods can actually last longer than a year on the shelf.

The general rule with home-canned goods is that a proper vacuum seal, along with storage in a dry, dark, and cool place (between 50°F and 70°F), will ensure a shelf life of at least one year.

The National Center for Home Food Preservation recommends that “for best quality, can no more food than you will use within a year.”

This ambiguous statement can be a little confusing, as many people take it to mean their home-canned goods will suddenly “expire” on day 366.

On the contrary, HFP’s recommendation is based on the quality of the food in terms of texture, color, and flavor, and not how well your jars are sealed.

If your jars have been stored under ideal conditions and the lids are still on tight, they can theoretically keep indefinitely. Those pickles may no longer be as crisp as the day they were canned, and certain nuances of the food (such as a subtle sweetness or spice) may be lost, but they’re indeed edible.

With good canning practices, there’s no reason the jam you made two or three years ago isn’t still safe to eat (and is probably still delicious). As with any food, inspect your canned goods before using and trust your instincts if the smell or appearance seems off.

The problem that some people do run into, however, is that the seals on the lids may fail for one reason or another after a year. This is why you should remove the bands (canning rings) from processed jars before putting them away, as you’ll be able to tell if any of the lids end up popping off in storage.

Canning Sources

This content was originally published here.