This is part of about 40 tomatoes, nice sized ones too, that I took to my moms and she showed me how to can. She says that there are LOTS of methods to canning that work. So I am showing you how she does it and learning along the way.
I am pretty sure my mom did not expect me to show up with any where near the number of tomatoes I had...you'll have to see why in tomorrows post.
First, we poured boiling water over the tomatoes, stirred them up for a couple of minutes till the skins started coming undone.
We were making sauce, so we pureed them. But I might try salsa if I am motivated enough to try this again.
Then we simmered them in a stock pot for several hours. I guess to reduce some of the water content and to sterilize the contents.
Then we brought in the stock pot and had a canning pot for the jars to be steamed/sterilized and lids to be boiled/sterilized.
We had 8 quarts...but the one with the circle around it on the right never did "pop", even after boiling it twice. So my mom kept it to use right away and I brought 7 quarts home!
This was not difficult but was a lot of work. I don't know if I will or will not be motivated to do it by myself...but if I do it will be next year, when baby is here and older! But it will be nice to have these to use and know they came from my own garden!
I did add some garlic to it, and cut some basil from my moms garden to add to it as well!
My next post will be about my moms garden...In the woods!