Wash and sanitize your jars. You’ll want to keep them warm to avoid having them crack when placed in the canner. You can fill them with hot water, or place them on a tray in the oven at 170F.
Wash your lids and set aside in clean place.
Cut the tops off the carrots. Rinse and peel, and then rinse again.
18 lbs carrots
HOT PACK: If you are hot packing your carrots, add them to a pot of boiling water and let them cook for 5 minutes.
RAW PACK: If you are raw packing, allow 8 (ish) cups of water to come to a boil in a pot or kettle.
8 cups water
Add 3 quarts of water to your pressure canner and put it on a burner set to high. Make sure there is a canning rack in the bottom of the canner.
Add the carrots to the jars. You really want to pack them in there. Pro tip: wiggle the jar often as you add the carrots to allow them to settle and make room for more.
Using a canning funnel, carefully and slowly add the clean boiling water, leaving 1-inch of headspace. Headspace is the distance between the top of the food and the top of the jar.
Using a long utensil (I prefer a plastic chopstick), remove all the air bubbles from the jar.
Clean the rim of the jar very well with a hot damp rag.
Place a clean lid on the jar. Add a ring, and tighten to fingertip tight.
Using canning tongs, gently place the jars in the canner. Lock the lid. Soon, steam will start coming through the vent pipe.
Allow the steam to pass through for about 10 minutes. Then put the pressure regulator on top.
Pretty soon, the air vent will pop up. Under normal conditions, hot or raw packed carrots need to be pressure canned at 11 pounds of pressure for 25 minutes for pints and 30 minutes for quarts. See chart above in post for any changes to processing times.
When the dial gauge reaches 11 pounds of pressure, reduce the burner temp to medium, and start your timer. The pressure must stay at 11 or (a little bit) above for the duration of the cooking time.
When the time is up, remove the canner from the burner and allow it to sit until you hear a distinctive “click” of the air vent dropping. Remove the pressure regulator and carefully remove the lid (Pro tip: I always use oven mitts when I take the lid off because the steam is super hot).
Let the jars sit for 5 minutes in the canner and then lift them out with canning tongs. Place on a thick clean towel undisturbed for 12 hours.
After a few hours, to check for sealing, gently press down in the middle of the lid. If the lid has no give, it’s sealed. If you can press the lid in and it pops a bit, your jars are not sealed.
Notes
Quarts: Salt (optional) 1 tspPints: Salt (optional) 1/2 tspStore in a cool dark place for 12 months.