Anyone else can?

It's a lot of work, but my mom was Italian and it's the best way to make sause. And since we're doing it, might as well make salsa also.

 

Nice! I typically freeze tomato sauce (or just blanch & peel tomatoes and freeze to make sauce later). We pickle & can jalapenos, and last year I canned peach butter too. I typically prefer to preserve by freezing because it's just easier (and we have a large chest freezer) but we'll can if we have something we really want to do.

 

That looks great!

It was my intention to get into canning this year. My broken leg has set that back a little. I freeze sauces and chili. I freeze my peppers and some tomatoes from my garden for later use in recipes.

Soups tend to get mushy when frozen, which is one good reason for canning.

 

How many tomato plants did you have?

My wife just used up the last of ours from 6 plants to make another jar of basic red sauce to freeze.

 

We don't have a chest freezer, and we freeze yellow beans (my wife's favorite ) and corn, there's a late season super sweet variety around here, so we buy a bag (5 dozen ) every year. That takes about half the freezer so we can the sauce. Pretty basic garlic, basil and onions. Then add other stuff depending on what we're making.

 

What type of canner do you use?

I still use an old fashioned pressure cooker but I have been looking at the new fandangled electric ones.

 

I'm impressed, Hooked, looks great! We don't can but do cook certain things in some bulk and freeze.

 

I think I can, I think I can.

 

We use a water bath canner, my mom had both for some things you need the pressure cooker but for what we do the bath is fine. When I was little I remember my mom canning tomatoes without processing them, she would fill the jars with boiling tomatoes, put the lid on then flip the jar over. But with food safety more well known she started processing them.

 

I only can things I can use a water bath canner for! No pressure cookers in my house....(yeah yeah, I know the modern ones are "safe" - sorry, not gonna do it ;-)

I only had 3 tomato plants this year - in pots. Half my raised bed garden was out of commission this year - I was amending the soil - I've had problems the past couple years so I have been working hard to fix so I can plant more tomatoes again next year. Needless to say - no freezing or sauce this year.....Did freeze some basil pesto pucks and some green beans, but that's about it. Rough year for drought here too....

 

There's a farm about 2 miles from us that we buy from, 3rd generation and they do business with me. So it's the only place I go. $44 got us two bushels of Roma tomatoes, four bunches of garlic, four huge sweet onions and a bunch of assorted peppers.

 

When we first got married my wife dumped a can of store sauce on spaghetti.........no that's not Italian. so I got a couple quarts off mom and showed her how to make it properly.

 

Amen, brah. We always have home-batched tom sauce (and/or Bolognese) in the freezer ... and we ain't even Italian. Sits right next to the chile verde that's always on hand, too.

 

My mother used to can all kinds of things. Her sisters and friends, that generation basically all canned and they used to swap, we got some good food like that. We also went to my aunt's (she married an Italian) to help make wine, tomato sauce, sausage, etc. Frankly canning and pressure cookers both scare me. I don't trust myself to can properly and if you do it wrong it could kill you. I remember my mother breaking a jar in the hot water bath and that made my decision. She also didn't teach me how to do it, probably for a good reason. She didn't have a pressure cooker either, probably for the same reason.

 

Ya botulism is bad lol, we've been canning for almost 30 years and haven't killed anyone yet. People used mayo jars alot years ago and they break, but we've never had a jar break....yet lol.

 

She used legit jars. But, guess where I get my klutz gene from?

 

lol

You won't die if you never try, but what fun is it hiding?

A friend is a chiropractor, he tells many of his patients to ride a bicycle for therapy and conditioning, but to make it a stationary bike, that if they ride a real bike on the street or path they might fall and get hurt. WTF? Four walls and a TV screen or blue sky and the beauty your area has to offer?

 

I've been wanting to try curing (I've made sausage) - but I'll have to find some good pork from a local farm - what my husband hunts is too lean (I had to buy pork fat to make sausage ;-) So we'll see if I get around to that in the next couple years. (I love book Charcuterie by Michael Ruhlman and others - some great recipes and instructions!)

 

I'll put in an order for some guanciale, please?!?

 

I have a friend that cures and smokes his own bacon, but he has a neighbor by his camp that's a hog farmer.