Bisphenol A & Canning Jar Lids

[paracelsus]

I read about this yesterday--that bisphenol A is used to coat the lids of canning jars. Ball admits this on their site: "Like the majority of commercial food packagers using glass jars with metal closures and metal sanitary cans, the coating on our home canning lids is designed to protect the metal from reacting with the food it contains. A small amount of Bisphenol A is present in the coating.":

http://www.freshpreserving.com/pages/faq/42.php

Kerr lids also have bisphenol A. I haven't found any that don't. Someone mentioned using waxed paper under the lid if just using it for storage. I don't know if that would make any difference.

I was very disappointed to read this, since I have been using canning jars not just for canning but instead of plastic containers for keeping bulk food and even for freezing. I have a LOT of jars. I have seen Weck jars, which have glass lids and rubber liners, but although they are beautiful, they are not cheap. It looks like the bisphenol A is not a BIG problem if you are not actually canning with the jars and if the food doesn't touch the lid. But I have noticed that when I get new canning jars, they have a funny smell inside. I have wondered if this was just the result of manufacturing or if it was something from the lid. Anyone else notice that smell?

[mtlouie]

Honestly, there's just no escaping their evil is there?

[Annie Oakley]

wow...that's just disturbing...I hadn't considered what that was on the bottom of the lid.
Plus all the heating they go through?!
At least we know it's not coating the inside of the glass bottle.....just when you figure that you have control over something........

[leaf51]

This is disturbing!  I also use class canning jars for everyday storage instead of pastic, because I thought it was safer   Do you know if the Bisphenol A is part of the metal lid itself?  Or, in the coating that seals with the rim of the jar? Thank you for bringing this to our attention.

[spacecase0]

when I boil the lids before canning they seem to loose that bad smell,
the canning jars that I use for storage get the lids reused so that they have lots of time to outgass

I almost give up...

[justanouveaufarmer]

I've quit buying canned food and gone to considerable trouble and expense canning my own food and getting rid of plastic in my house.  And now I find even my organic, painstakingly processed HOME CANNED food is full of it??!?

Well Fuckety Fuck Fuck Fuck!!!

 

[paracelsus]

One of the canning companies said that the bisphenol A is sandwiched between two layers of metal. That doesn't make any sense. What good would it do then? According to stuff I've read around the web, the bisphenol A is in the white part of the lid. It's a coating that is supposed to keep the metal from reacting with the food. I too have been washing the lids and saving them to reuse on things that are not canned but just in storage. Turns out the more you wash them, the more the bisphenol A is released. And of course heat releases bisphenol A also.

I've read various fixes or workarounds, but they are for non-canned situations, using the canning jars for storage. You can cover the inside of the lid with, say, natural waxed paper, or if you are not storing anything too acidic or salty, aluminum foil. I looked online for any sort of metal lid that would fit that did not have an inner coating that was problematic. The lid size is 70/400. I found some that were coated with PPE, which seems to be pretty much non-toxic. They were about 30 cents a lid, but the shipping was almost $16, so I didn't go for that. And they are not canning lids. They are just metal lids.

I was going to buy a pressure canner this year and then talked myself out of it because I thought I wouldn't use it as much as I thought. Then this fall when I decided to rent some land for growing next year, I started thinking about a pressure canner again. I too avoid regular canned foods like mad. But now this sure has put a spoke in my wheels. I am really pissed off about it, but I do not know what I can do about it other than buy Weck jars, which are so expensive and which require a whole different learning curve. As for my storage, I have tons of jars that I now will open and reseal putting a thing of waxed paper in there. And I don't even know how really helpful that is. There isn't any studies on it or anything.

[Hope@ZeroKelvin]

I've quit buying canned food and gone to considerable trouble and expense canning my own food and getting rid of plastic in my house.  And now I find even my organic, painstakingly processed HOME CANNED food is full of it??!?

Well Fuckety Fuck Fuck Fuck!!!

 

HaHAHAHAHA, snort, snort, HAHAHA!  That is my sentiments exactly.  I am going to steal your phrase.

However, since I live within about 100 miles of 30% of the US oil refining capacity, perhaps worrying about bisphenolA in my canning lids is likely spitting in the wind!  There is just no escape from the chemical contamination of our world, sigh.

Saying that, arrgghh!!!

I have my own fav recipe for apple pie filling that I like to put up every fall when apples get cheap ($2/5 lbs) so I can make yummy apple pies or tarts in the winter.

[nicekitty]

I am pretty certain that the small area of the lid (versus the inside area of the whole can) is an improvement.  Also, I think contact with acidic foods accelerated the release of bisphenol-A, which means that your lid (not in contact with the tomato sauce or whatever) is a huge step up from the canned stuff.

Having said that, you could check into the rubber rings for the old jars with the glass tops.  If the rings don't have bisphenol-A, you're home-free.  I don't know about the rest of the world, but around here you can routinely find canning jars with glass lids at garage sales for about 10 cents per jar...

[Xenopus]

I am pretty certain that the small area of the lid (versus the inside area of the whole can) is an improvement.  Also, I think contact with acidic foods accelerated the release of bisphenol-A, which means that your lid (not in contact with the tomato sauce or whatever) is a huge step up from the canned stuff.

Yes, I'm inclined to agree. BPA has to touch the food to do any damage. My canning lids don't touch the food.

Having said that, you could check into the rubber rings for the old jars with the glass tops.  If the rings don't have bisphenol-A, you're home-free.  I don't know about the rest of the world, but around here you can routinely find canning jars with glass lids at garage sales for about 10 cents per jar...

You can often find them on craigslist, too. I think those rings are pure rubber.

[paracelsus]

Well, are you considering what happens when you can? The application of intense heat and the food in the jar--it doesn't just sit on the bottom of the jar. And most of the time, the stuff being canned is acidic to boot.

There are glass lidded jars out there, and they are expensive, but I am going to start buying them a few at a time and learning how to use them, because there is no way I am going to go through all this trouble of growing and buying organic stuff and then canning it just so I can inject bisphenol A into my food. The rings Weck has are pure rubber, so that's something. But for now, I am freezing things. I had left off doing that, thinking that it could be a problem to have a freezer full of food and no electric some day. Well, some day isn't here now, so freezing it is. Things do freeze much better in glass, I have found. I use canning jars to freeze and am covering the inside of the lid with waxed paper that does not contain any ingredients more worrisome (so far) than soy wax and unbleached paper.

I am still so pissed off by this. It's like teflon. You can't choose not to use it.

[nicekitty]

I agree.  It's almost impossible to avoid.  I have been on a bit of a crusade around here about getting rid of teflon AND plastic (BPA or otherwise).  I've had to tone it down, though, as plastic is, truly, everywhere.

With the glass lids and rubber rings...my MIL has informed me that the glass lids fail to seal waayy more often than the metal lids, and that it's harder to tell when they have failed.  Something to keep in mind.

[paracelsus]

I've heard that about the glass lids, but apparently there are some slight differences in how you go about doing it. I haven't looked into that yet. I do have a couple of British books on "bottling," and they are not quite as anal about it as we are. OTOH, I'll never forget reading about the lady who took a tiny bite of some canned carrots she was doubtful about and spent the next six months in intensive care. Note to self--freeze carrots. But on yet another hand, I recently added another wild edibles ID book to my collection, and it was so full of warnings danger danger that I just felt like tossing it. It reminded me of the time I was on the FDA website and saw they listed sage as a dangerous herb.

[nicekitty]

Sage?  Dangerous? 

You're probably fine canning anything high-acid...worst that will happen with a failed seal will be mould or some fermentation...nothing worth freaking out about.  Except for the lost time and labour, which drives me nuts.  With low-acid stuff, you'll have to be MUCH more careful.

[Hope@ZeroKelvin]

Well, I have been to 3 different groc stores, Tractor Supply and WalMart and can't find those fancy pants jars you guys are talking about.

I look at it like this:  What I am canning, even with the bisphenolA is STILL better than what comes out of a commercial can.  Have you read the labels on those cans/crap?

As long as you don't invert the can and leave enought headspace, you should probably be okay.  Perhaps the bisphenolA released will vent during the sealing process??