When the kitchen looks like this...

...it tends to scare my husband!

But don't worry, its not what it looks like, unless you think it looks like I've been canning beets, in which case you would be right.  I LOVE beets and although canning them can be a bit messy and time consuming it is well worth it to me.  I thought I would share the process I go through in case anyone out there might want to try canning some themselves.

First off, you must remove all the skin from the beets before canning.  Trust me, you don't want to have a bright red foamy mess in your storage area...believe me, its not pretty.  What I do is remove the leaves from the beets then boil them whole until the skin slips off easily. It will take a bit of time and it all depends on the size of the beets.  I usually take one out to test it.  When they are ready I put them all into a large bowl of cold water

At this point I move to the counter where I have a large cutting board where I remove the top and tail and slip off the skin revealing a beautiful, shiny beet.  Usually there are still a few pieces of skin sticking to the beet so for the next step...

 I slip the beets into another bowl with water.  This washes the beets one last time before I...

 Chop them into smaller pieces.  I used to slice the beets, but it took more time and I came too close to slicing my own finger too many times.  Now I just make chunks and it works well for me.

 Now I have a bowl of beautiful and fully prepped beets ready for canning.  Because they are a low acid vegetable, they need to be canned in a pressure canner.  Follow the directions given in your instruction booklet.

 And thats it!  I can almost taste them now just looking at them.  I might just have to go open a can for a late night snack.