The Ball Blue Book is one of the two main books in the accepted American canon of home canning (the other being the USDA Complete Guide.) The Ball Blue Book provides recipes and procedures for water bathed home preserves, as well as basic procedures and some recipes for pressure canning.
Ball Canning: “Hi Randal, the new version is updated with new recipes and additional tips and tricks and can be used in conjunction [with the 2013]” Ball Canning Rep on Facebook to Randal Oulton 9 February 2015. Correspondence on file.” Jarden Corporation Press Release.
All of their recipes are lab-tested for safety. Although a given recipe (say, Mustard Pickle) might appear to violate the general rule of thumb of “no flour in canning recipes”, such a recipe passes muster with flying colours owing to a higher rule: lab-tested by Ball.