Funnel Fundamentals

Moving food from the bowl or the cooking pot to the jar can be a messy affair. Drips and spills are inevitable, and having boiling hot food running down the jar while you’re trying to handle it isn’t fun. Sticky syrups are the worst. So, what do you do?

Enter the canning funnel. This remarkable adaptation of the traditional cooking funnel has a wider opening at the base and thanks to the marvels of scientific engineering, it fits beautifully in pint or quart jars. Here’s a picture of my green canning funnel. A few posts down the road you’ll get to see it in action.

Older canning funnels were made of aluminum with a little handle at the side. The handle heated up and was difficult to grasp. Newer ones are made from space-age plastics and have a handle a linebacker could hang onto.

You need a canning funnel to make the job easier and safer. Check the canning section of your local hardware store. I bought mine locally, and this is a good time to do that- Become a locavore!