Month: September 2009

About every other year  I make my mother come over for a day of canning tomatoes.  I love to be able to make chili, lasagna or almost anything with our canned tomatoes.  I am trying to eat healthier and this will help with fresh tomatoes that we know what all is in the jar!  I do not want to forget how to do this , so I am going to blog how…that way if you don’t have an awesome Mom like mine, you can learn too! So here goes …first you must make sure all of your jars are clean.  I run mine through the dishwasher.  If you are in the market for a new dishwasher, I just love my two drawer one from Fisher & Paykel.  It was a great descision.

Gather up all your necessary equipment as follows: Pressure canner, canning salt, funnel, big ladle, paring knives lids, rims  and jars and jar grabber for taking out hot jars from the canner.  We made two kinds of tomatoes: Stewed ( with green peppers, onions and celery) and then just whole tomatoes alone in the jars.  So if you want to make stewed tomatoes, you will need some green peppers, onions and celery.  

Cut or chop your green peppers, onion and celery  then add a little water and simmer them for a bit to soften them a little .

While that is simmering, dump your tomatoes into the sink and rinse them to get any dirt or bugs or junk off of them.  

Then place them into a roasting pan with boiling water to scald them for a few minutes.  The skins with break.  Do not leave them in too long or they will become too hot and mushy to handle.  

Transfer them into a sink of cold water.  You will then remove the center stem and all of the skins,  Cut then in quarters and place in a bucket. Do this until you have all of your tomatoes cleaned, scalded and peeled and cut.

Add fixings for stewed tomatoes if desired to pot of cut tomatoes, stir…

Looking real good right now!

add about an 1″ or two of water to the canner.

add a teaspoon of salt to each jar

using a large funnel (get it at fleet farm) scoop your tomatoes in the jar- i used small mouth jars for the stewed tomatoes and wide for the whole.  You would use your hands to pack the whole tomatoes.

fill jars almost to the top and leave a half inch of space at the top not counting the lid rim.

 

 

 

 

carefully wipe of the top of each jar- so the lids will seal properly

Place lid and ring on jar

place 7 jars in canner, place cover on  and place the “jimmy” that is what I call the pressure gauge, on 10lbs of pressure

I place the burner on HIGH until the “Jimmy” starts to jiggle.  I then turn it down a little.  The “Jimmy” does not have to jiggle constantly.  Once the canner start to jiggle you need to let it pressurize to 20min.  After 20 min.  turn off heat and let the canner release its pressure.  When it is all out  it will allow you to open it.  I have to admit Mom taught me how to cheat and hold a long meat fork on the pressure gauge until all of the steam is let out.  This helps if you have lots of canning to do and don’t have time to wait, but I am sure this is not recommended anywhere and you cannot hold me accountable if something happens to you when you are doing yours.

When all of the pressure is released from the canner open the lid and lift out your jars with the canning tongs.  

Place hot jars on a protected surface.  I used towel on the kitchen table, double folded.  The jars will ting when the lids seal.  

Here are our 84 jars!  It took us from 10am to 7pm when the last 7 were processed.  We have 31 stewed tomatoes and 53 whole tomatoes.  I think we will be set for awhile.  We did this last Wednesday.  My uncle brought us over 2 bushels and this is how many we ended up with.  Now I will remember how to do this and maybe you will now try it yourself!

Hey…here is a pic of my Mom…on our boat this summer..in her “Jackie O” sunglasses…she wore them long enough that they are back in style now..