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monica
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| Posted: July 04 2009 at 7:28pm | IP Logged
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i am going to attempt canning tomatoes again this year. i have tried in the past, but never been satisfied with the results. i have ended up buying canned tomatoes in the store because they tasted better than what i could make. so, what are your tricks, recipes, etc to get delicious canned tomatoes?
monica
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mcchatty
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| Posted: July 06 2009 at 5:54pm | IP Logged
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I grew up in Muncie Indiana- home of the Ball jar! I would love to give you my recipes, but I have two questions first- what method of canning do you use (pressure or water bath?) and what variety of tomatoes?..(romas or beefsteak?)
mcchatty
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monica
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| Posted: July 06 2009 at 9:00pm | IP Logged
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i use a water bath and i was just going to get what tomatoes were at the farmers market, but hopefully roma ones. arent they the ones you make sauce from? not the big fat ones, but the kind of oblong, oval ones.
monica
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Cay Gibson
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| Posted: July 07 2009 at 9:03am | IP Logged
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Wanted to share a few tomato ideas.
Lissa shared this dish on FB.
And there are more ideas under this thread.
My bil dug up the tomato plants this past weekend but I still have two full bowls of tomatoes that I need to cook. I've already canned and frozen lots.
Enjoy!
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mcchatty
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| Posted: July 07 2009 at 9:46am | IP Logged
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Ok- to can romas (aka plum tomatoes) Set up to can starting one extra pot of boiling water. You must add an acid to home canned toamtoes- I use fresh lemon juice, but white wine vinegar would work too. I start by squeezing a couple of lemons into a small cup, get out a Tablespoon measure and set both aside. Meanwhile prep the romas - I don't actually core them, just cut an X across the stem end. Working in batches, blanch the tomatoes in boiling water. I use a pasta scoop to remove them as soon as I see their skins burst. I let them cool in a colander in my sink, I avoid rinsing them. Using your fingers peel off the skins. As soon as your jars are sterile , line them up. Put a TBS of lemon juice in each one. Add tomatoes up to the "shoulders" of the jar. Top each with a good pinch of coarse kosher salt. Proceed with getting your hot lids on and giving them their water bath. is that any different than what you have been trying?
More often, I can a simple tomato"sauce". In a HUGE pot saute about 5 yellow onions finely diced in a combination of butter and olive oil. When golden Nearly fill your pot with quartered, skinned romas ( I start with about 7 lbs- but it's not too precise... Add about two cups of chicken stock(from a box is fine) Cook for several hours uncovered. When it's the consistency I want,-not terribly watery, but not marinara sauce either, I add about 12 cloves of garlic- finely minced (food processor) taste for salt, using coarse kosher salt. Fill your jars and finish canning.(I just noticed I don't add any acid to this- all I can say is I have made this for 20 years and never had a jar go bad). Use it on pasta, adding whatever you want, basil or meatballs. I find this stuff really useful- a jar becomes the base of veggie soup, or minestrone, or chili Cook down on the stove for pizza sauce. I season it so simply so it is versatile.
What else are you canning?
mcchatty
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monica
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| Posted: July 07 2009 at 10:15pm | IP Logged
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GREAT!! this is just what i was looking for. i usually use canned tomatoes for sauces or soup bases, so that recipe with onions and garlic is great. i love the ones that have been used without fail for years.
tomatoes are the only veggie i can. blackberries should come out soon and then i will make jam with them and later plum and apricot jam. i made some strawberry jam, but not that much and we have eaten most of it 
cay, it is funny that tomato season is ending down there, we are just now getting red ones in the garden.
what are others canning now?
monica
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Stephanie_Q
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| Posted: July 08 2009 at 10:42am | IP Logged
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mcchatty wrote:
More often, I can a simple tomato"sauce". In a HUGE pot saute about 5 yellow onions finely diced in a combination of butter and olive oil. When golden Nearly fill your pot with quartered, skinned romas ( I start with about 7 lbs- but it's not too precise... Add about two cups of chicken stock(from a box is fine) Cook for several hours uncovered. When it's the consistency I want,-not terribly watery, but not marinara sauce either, I add about 12 cloves of garlic- finely minced (food processor) taste for salt, using coarse kosher salt. Fill your jars and finish canning.(I just noticed I don't add any acid to this- all I can say is I have made this for 20 years and never had a jar go bad). Use it on pasta, adding whatever you want, basil or meatballs. I find this stuff really useful- a jar becomes the base of veggie soup, or minestrone, or chili Cook down on the stove for pizza sauce. I season it so simply so it is versatile.
mcchatty
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This is very similar to what we do, but I've never added chicken stock; we add parsley and brown sugar to the onion-tomato-garlic-salt. I've never added any kind of acid, either. I wonder if "cooking down" the tomato increases the acidity level so that it is "safe".
I've always gone from hot water to cold water to strainer when blanching. The cold water seems to make them easier to peel (like with eggs?). Just wondering why you would want to avoid rinsing?
Also, we use a combo of Roma and some tomatoes that have more flavor (Rutgers and Brandywine, this year).
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mcchatty
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| Posted: July 08 2009 at 6:51pm | IP Logged
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Dear Stephanie,
It may well be that cooking down the tomatoes increases their acid. it might also be that since they are throughly precooked any lingering bad microbes are nuked.
I don't rinse them simply becasue my Gram and Mom didn't. Wish I had a more scientific answer, but there it is. Gram said that a lot of flavor was just under the skin, so you shouldn't rinse it off. The boiling water bath breaks the skins, I only leave them to cool until I can handle them.
LOVE Brandywine, mine are doing well this year. My current fave is "Mr Stripey".
mcchatty
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monica
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| Posted: July 09 2009 at 3:15pm | IP Logged
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well, a farmer told me to wait 2 weeks and then the tomatoes will be at their ripest, so i have some time to get together my cans, lids, get another big pot, etc. i am excited to use these recipes. i figured i probably use canned tomatoes 2 times a week, so i am going for 100 jars. i wonder how many lbs of tomatoes that is?
monica
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mcchatty
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| Posted: July 09 2009 at 4:51pm | IP Logged
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Well, the formula I use is two and 1/4 about lbs of 'maters makes a quart when canned. So you are looking at about 235 lbs. I hope you have a BIG basket.....
It's doable though, I can more than that, but I don't do it all at once. I usually can toomaotes at least 3 times a summer.
I also do, dill and bread and butter pickles, apple, cherry and blueberry pie filling (a nice gift item- give with a recipe and maybe a pie pan) sauerkraut, salsa, chili sauce and some chutneys.
Good luck!
mcchatty
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florasita
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| Posted: July 11 2009 at 9:23am | IP Logged
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wow we do not even have flowers on most of our plants yet  !
I've never canned tomatoes at all but would love to try . How long do you keep jars in the water bath ? I do my pickles / erlish in water bath but not sure if tomatoes vary in time needed in bath .
I just finished watching all the episodes of pioneer quest ( much better then pbs frontier house ) and am really inspired to do my pickles again etc. they even canned the deer meat and said it was so good compared to the meat they cold stored .
we've a local MCC secondhand nearby and they always have loads of jars if I run out .
I'm terrible at making jam and so would like to perfect this somehow but I'll start a new topic now for that
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mcchatty
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| Posted: July 11 2009 at 3:14pm | IP Logged
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IN a water bath method- make sure your cans are covered by at least one inch of boiling water and process for 45 minutes for quarts, 40 minutes for pints.-that's for raw tomatoes. Cooked tomato sauce takes 25 minutes. Pull them out. Let cool for several hours, any lids that are still loose didn't safely seal. Tighten your jar rings and you are done.
See ya over at the jam thread....Mcchatty
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monica
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| Posted: July 16 2009 at 2:32pm | IP Logged
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one more question- i have inherited a lot of canning jars and lids. i was wondering if you use the wide mouth ones more for tomatoes/ tomato sauce and the smaller mouth ones for jams/ jellies. thats what makes sense to me, but i was wondering what others do
monica
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mcchatty
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Yes, that's what I do. A plastic funnel is very useful for filling little jars. Good luck- mcchatty
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monica
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| Posted: July 18 2009 at 8:53am | IP Logged
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one more question, mcchatty. in the recipe you gave for canning a tomato sauce, were you starting with the tomatoes you had already boiled and peeled? so, is it a two phase process? first boiling and peeling and then cooking with the onions, chicken broth and garlic. is that right?
monica
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mcchatty
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It is two steps- but you don't "cook" the tomatoes in the first step- you drop them into boiling water for a couple of minutes (literally- 90 to 120 seconds) and then yank them out- most people rinse them under cold water. I don't. I let them loiter in the colander until they are cool enough to rub the skins off.
To be very specific:
Fill a big pot about half full. Bring to a vigorous boil. Meanwhile core your tomaotes (or cut a cross hatch in the stem end- if romas) Dump several into the pot. When the skins split- scoop them out into a colander. Repeat 09238409842097 times. ;)Intemittently, set some aside- so they don't keep getting new hot comrades dumped on top of them. Rub their skins off, squish them with your hands and either
1- add them to the already softened onioins and garlic
or
2. Park them in a big container until your pot of aromatics is ready.
I hope that helps.
love, mcchatty
ps- you can start your pot of sauce and keep adding tomatoes to it- even over a course of days, just refrigerate it when you aren't cooking it. It does need to be boiling hot when you jar it up.
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juststartn
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| Posted: July 22 2009 at 3:03pm | IP Logged
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I don't rinse my tomatoes (I just made salsa yesterday--first batch of the year)...but what I've found works for me is a two colander method. One colander is in the pot with the boiling water. When the tomatoes are finished in the boiling water, I lift them out, and put them into another colander, which is resting in a big mixing bowl full of cold water and ice--to shock them and keep them from cooking further.
Then I can put the first colander back into the boiling water, and do another batch. By the time those are done, the first batch has cooled. Boil, cool, repeat--as many times as needed. LOL
I put the scalded/cooled tomatoes into more big mixing bowls and then work from there, peeling the skins.
Don't know if this idea would work for anyone else...
Rachel
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4Real Forums : Our Lady's Loom, Larder, and Laundry
Topic: tried and true canning tomato recipes
