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Ontario, Canada
I am a wife, mother and grandma who enjoys the many aspects of homemaking. A variety of interests and hobbies combined with travel keep me active. They reflect the importance of family, friends, home and good food.
Cook ingredients that you are used to cooking by other techniques, such as fish, chicken, or hamburgers. In other words be comfortable with the ingredients you are using.
--Bobby Flay

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  • [March 19, 2020] - Effective Mar 17, this blog will no longer accept advertising. The reason is very simple. If I like a product, I will promote it without compensation. If I don't like a product, I will have no problem saying so.
  • [March 17, 2020] - A return to blogging! Stay tuned for new tips, resources and all things food related.
  • [February 1, 2016] - An interesting report on why you should always choose organic tea verses non-organic: Toxic Tea (pdf format)
  • Sticky Post - Warning: 4ever Recap reusable canning lids. The reports are growing daily of these lids losing their seal during storage. Some have lost their entire season's worth of canning to these seal failures! [Update: 4ever Recap appears to be out of business.]

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Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Canning Tomatoes

September is always a busy canning month in our household. During a short period of about 14 days an average of 10 hampers of tomatoes are processed. Each hamper is ⅝ of a bushel. If I'm making any tomato product that can be run through the food strainer such as soup or smooth sauces I can comfortably process 2 hampers myself in a somewhat long day. Any tomato product that takes more prep work means fewer tomatoes are processed in a day. On salsa and chili sauce days my husband helps with both the prep work and canning. It is easier to do both of these labour intensive products on the same day.

chili sauce and salsasChili Sauce & Salsas

Chili sauce and salsas are labour intensive products because all of the tomatoes are peeled and all vegetables added are hand chopped. This results in a nice, chunky product quite unlike store bought. Pictured are the total jars of tomato products my husband and I canned Sunday. We started with 2 hampers of tomatoes and used 1½ hampers. The yield was 11 - 500 ml jars of old fashioned chili sauce, 19 - 500ml jars of hot salsa, 13 - 500 ml jars of medium salsa and 12 - 250 ml jars of medium salsa for a grand total of 55 jars of yummy food for gift giving and the pantry. All the jars sealed. I have removed the rings and washed the jars so the final step before storage is to label the jars. I use a fine tip Sharpie to write the contents and date on the lid. The jars are then loaded back into the original cases and transfered to the pantry for storage.


6 food lovers commented:

Juli said...

That is a lot of canning :) you guys should certainly eat well this winter!

Garden Gnome said...

Hi Juli and thanks for visiting. Our pantry will be well stocked for the winter and then some :)

Garden Gnome said...

Hi Booksflowers and thanks so much for visiting. This is one of the sweetest comments I have ever received. Thank-you so very much!

Garden Gnome said...

Hi Talk2myCPA thanks for visiting and adding me to your favourites. I have to tell you you won't be disappointed with the Old Fashioned Chili Sauce. It is a real keeper sure to please. I do hope you enjoy it!

Anonymous said...

Why do you remove the ring? Just curious, I never do
Sandra

Garden Gnome said...

Hi Sandra, I take the rings off to clean the jars and check for seals. Removing the rings also helps detect any false seals. Once the ring is removed I pull up on the edge of the lid to make sure it is secure. If the rings are left on any food leakage can cause the rings to stick making them hard to remove later. This also prevents any rusting issues.