Canning?

ROASTED TOMATO SAUCE (from Cook's Illustrated)

3 to 3 1/2 Cups—For 1 Pound of Pasta. Published March 1, 2007.

This sauce is best with short pasta shapes, such as ziti or penne. It can also be served over chicken Parmesan or grilled fish. If serving this sauce with pasta, save some of the pasta cooking water to adjust the sauce's consistency. Plum tomatoes can be used, but the sauce may require even more pasta cooking water. Because fresh tomatoes vary in sweetness, it's best to add sugar to taste before serving. The sauce can be refrigerated in an airtight container for up to 2 days; bring to a simmer before using. [my edit: or can according to Ball canning instructions!!]


2 tablespoons tomato paste
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons minced fresh thyme leaves
1/8 teaspoon red pepper flakes
3 pounds vine-ripened tomatoes (9 to 12 medium), cored and halved pole to pole
6 medium cloves garlic , peeled
1 small onion , peeled and cut into 1/2-inch rounds
1 teaspoon red wine vinegar
Granulated sugar to taste (up to 2 teaspoons; see note above)
2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil
INSTRUCTIONS
1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 475 degrees. Combine tomato paste, 1 tablespoon oil, thyme, pepper flakes, 3/4 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper in large bowl. Toss tomatoes, garlic, and onion with tomato paste mixture until evenly coated. Place 4-inch square of foil in center of wire rack set in rimmed baking sheet lined with aluminum foil. Place garlic cloves and onion rounds on foil and arrange tomatoes, cut side down, around garlic and onion.

2. Roast until vegetables are soft and tomato skins are well charred, 45 to 55 minutes. Remove baking sheet from oven and let cool 5 minutes. Transfer garlic and onion to food processor; pulse until finely chopped, about five 1-second pulses. Add tomatoes, vinegar, and remaining tablespoon oil to food processor. Pulse until broken down but still chunky, about five 1-second pulses. Using rubber spatula, scrape down bowl; season with salt, pepper, and sugar to taste. Continue to process sauce until slightly chunky, about five 1-second pulses. Stir in basil.

That's all good advice, Carolintexas.

I would add, however, that if you use your library's resources, make certain they are very current publications. A lot of guidelines have changed in recent years and some libraries may not have culled their out-of-date books and pamphlets.

Jeff, the only reason I chop onions and peppers before freezing is so that all I have to do is just spoon them out into whatever I'm making. As you said, you don't really want to use them in salads, as the texture goes off a bit, but then you have zero waste -- if you have whole veg, they can't be refrozen. (Chopped veg also tend to take up a little less room, too.)

I thought I would post this link again. It is to the National Center for Home Food Preservation. They are considered the bible for canning safety guidelines. They have free canning safe recipes and detailed instructions with videos. They also offer a free online course. Canning is not hard you just need to follow the guidelines. The most important thing is to remember to use only approved canning recipes. Cooking recipes and canning recipes are two complete different things.

http://www.uga.edu/nchfp/

Scott

Scotch - with any other fruit/veggie I would agree with you, but tomatoes have such a high acid content pretty much any tomato recipe will do. Cook and then follow any reliable published canning method.

Maybe I am more experimental because I have been canning for so long, but I've always understood that with the high acid stuff like tomato and lemon, blackberry and pomegranate, you can mess with the ingredients as long as you process for the proper amount of time in the boiling water bath.

I could be totally wrong, but I'm not dead yet

But yes, those new to canning should stick with the written guidelines.

Even with the acid in tomatos. New guidelines suggest the addition of lemon juice if you are water bath canning.

Wal-mart and other such stores carry the Ball Blue book. Even with the years I have been canning I now do add the lemon juice. Just to be safe.

Could vinegar take the place of lemon juice?

Yes , you could use vinegar if you like the taste better. If you use lemon juice it is recommended to use bottled juice as the the acidity is cosistent.

Scott

You can't taste the lemon juice. I was concerned the first time useing it, but I couldn't taste it at all.

Commercial vinegar is diluted to 5% acidity, so if memory serves me correctly, you have to add about double the amount of vinegar as lemon juice, and to me that does affect the taste, even though that is the method I usually use. Depending on the use, I sometimes add a pinch of sugar after opening to counteract the taste.

The reason tomatoes are no longer considered safe without additional acid is because the acidity varies widely among the many varieties, as well as with the degree of ripeness. I think I also read that the soil they are grown in can affect the acid content.

If you add even small amounts of low-acid foods such as onions and peppers, you have further reduced the acid content of the finished product, and those mixtures should only be canned using a pre-tested recipe, following precise instructions.

Bottom line to be repeated again and again: Follow instructions in an up-to-date canning guide such as the Ball Blue Book.

Carol, to freeze beans, I've always blanched them (dunked them in boiling water) for a minute or two, poured them out on a towel and let them dry a little (so they don't stick together), and spread them out on a cookie sheet to freeze. When they're frozen, I pour them in a big ziplock.

You cook them just like fresh - steamed for a few minutes, stewed with bacon and onions (yes, the nutrients cook out a little, but they're tasty, and that's how we've made them in my family for generations).

The texture is a little softer than fresh, but they're good even just steamed with a little butter or oil drizzled over them (if you can get walnut oil, hooboy is THAT good)

I'm nowhere near ready to start canning (it'll be my first time this summer), but I thought I'd pick up the Ball Blue Book to start learning. (I'll pick up the equipment over the next few weeks). First, I looked for it on EBay... lowest price was $9.95. So I thought OK... well I'll look around a bit first. Then I went grocery shopping, and there it was, in the 'seasonal' aisle... for $6.99... AND a dollar off! WooHoo!

Next will be to haunt the thrift shops for the water-bath canner and tools. I'll think about the pressure canner when I can afford to buy that new. WOOHOO!

Carolintexas, you can still can green beans if you like. You just have to use a pressure cooker to be safe. Or you can pickle them. Dilled green beans are one of our younger daughter's favorite Christmas gifts, and pickled green beans can be water-bathed.

When I freeze green beans, I prefer to leave them whole, but you can also freeze them snapped or cut up. I do them as LaFee does, except that I blanch them for three minutes, and then I plunge them into a sink of ice water to stop the cooking. I think that's supposed to retain more nutrients. After three or four minutes in the cold water I spread them on towels to briefly air dry before placing them on cookie sheets in the freezer.

I blanch them in batches, and start cooking time as soon as they are placed in the boiling water. (If you try to blanch too many at once, the water will stop boiling and then you have to guess at the time needed.)

When I place the frozen beans into ziploc bags for storage, I place a straw in the corner of the bag, and close the bag to the straw, then suck out as much air as possible, and quickly remove the straw while closing the remaining gap. The more air you remove, the longer the beans will keep in the freezer. (They do not go "bad" as to make you sick, but they can get freezer burn or start to lose their flavor and nutrients after several months.) Date and label the bags and keep frozen until ready to use.

I stir-fry or steam whole green beans, and I use cut beans in vegetable soups.

Wyldflower,

You don't need to look for a canning pot for water-bath canning. Any heavy large pot will work, as long as you can put a sufficient amount of water in it to cover your jars by an inch or so and you can put the jars on a rack to keep them off the bottom of the pot. I often use my large steamer pot with a large cake-type rack in the bottom. No problem. On the other hand, as someone earlier in the thread mentioned, new pressure canners are far safer than old ones, so I'd be careful about picking one up at a yard sale, just for safety reasons.

Enjoy!

About blanching tomatoes and peppers....

When making tomato sauces for canning, I rarely blanch and remove the skins from tomatoes and peppers. I cook the sauce, the put everything through a food mill. Voila! No seeds or skins and I didn't have to do all of that prep work.

Cropper2 wrote:About blanching tomatoes and peppers....

When making tomato sauces for canning, I rarely blanch and remove the skins from tomatoes and peppers. I cook the sauce, the put everything through a food mill. Voila! No seeds or skins and I didn't have to do all of that prep work.

+1

Cropper2 wrote:Wyldflower,

You don't need to look for a canning pot for water-bath canning. Any heavy large pot will work, as long as you can put a sufficient amount of water in it to cover your jars by an inch or so and you can put the jars on a rack to keep them off the bottom of the pot. I often use my large steamer pot with a large cake-type rack in the bottom. No problem. On the other hand, as someone earlier in the thread mentioned, new pressure canners are far safer than old ones, so I'd be careful about picking one up at a yard sale, just for safety reasons.

Enjoy!

Thanks for the advice Cropper! I was thinking along those lines, but the biggest pot that I already had is a dutch oven and probably not even big enough for pint jars. I was lucky over the weekend and found a granite-ware canning pot with the rack, and it only cost me $4.50. I'm definitely going to get a NEW pressure canner when the time comes. When it comes to 'technology' I want to be sure that what I have will work right.

That's true...however, for those of us taught to slice a shallow x in the blossom end, them pop them into boiling water for a minute or two...then into a sink filled with ice and water....it seems odd to put them into a food mill.

Just seems like I'm skipping a step...and it just doesn't seem right to me.

(That's not at all to be taken to not use a food mill if it works for you...just that I have to follow the rhythms and processes my gran taught me....aren't we creatures of habit?!)

LaFee wrote:That's true...however, for those of us taught to slice a shallow x in the blossom end, them pop them into boiling water for a minute or two...then into a sink filled with ice and water....it seems odd to put them into a food mill.

Just seems like I'm skipping a step...and it just doesn't seem right to me.

(That's not at all to be taken to not use a food mill if it works for you...just that I have to follow the rhythms and processes my gran taught me....aren't we creatures of habit?!)

I like this method to can tomatoes whole in the jar.

THANKS EVERYONE! I printing off all of the canning, freezing suggestions to save for later in the summer. I truly appreciate everyone's ideas because like I have said I hope I have plenty of veggies "to put up" for winter but have no experience.

make sure you ask around, Carol...canning is easy work if you've got two or three people...and the operation is then efficient enough to can enough for everybody!

You might get lucky and find someone who already cans and can guide you...or someone who's gramma taught them to put up vegetables, but still finds it too much work for just one person...or someone else who wants to learn along with you!

(My earliest memories as a kid are of my grandma's postage-stamp kitchen, with jars and lids laid out on the table, and her sisters and nieces all bustling around the kitchen, putting all kinds of vegetables by for the winter.)

For all those beginners out there: IT IS EASIER THAN YOU THINK. This is my first year doing SFG and canning. Over the weekend I canned my first jars.

All were done in half pint jars

7 Sweet Relish

8 Dill Relish

3 Pickled Jalopeno Peppers

I followed the instructions in the Ball Blue Book. The only thing I did different from the book was soak my cucumber mix over night. The rest of the process only took me about an hour and a half to go from start to finish on all my jars.

I have a large water bath canner with a rack made for quart jars. Since I used smaller jars I put a towel in the bottom of the canner to keep the jars from touching the bottom. It worked out great.

So give it a try. I did and it worked just like SFG works.