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Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Canning Tomatoes

While I'm going through all this difficulty with the internet and my computer, I decided it was as good a time as any to can some tomatoes. I should call it, "The Canning Tomatoe Blues". 
Late August/early September is the season for doing this (as well as peaches and peppers).
 So the first thing to do is wash them. It's something else when you have 500 tomatoes sitting in your sink.
 Then you cut them up into quarters so they'll go through the machine easily.
 Whoops, a blurry shot of cooking them up.
Here they are going through the machine. The skins and seeds are coming out of the strainer into the pot and the pulp and juice are strained through the sieve and going into the bowl. 
Pretty neat. I love doing the tomatoes, such production!
So the pulp and juice are cooked together and then poured into sterilized jars with a bit of salt and basil leaves, tops are screwed on and then placed under blankets (seen in the background).
I love listening to the "popping" through the day.
 And here they are, about 20 litres from one bushel. The thing is though, they'll be gone before too long. Major pasta eaters in this house.

4 comments:

  1. Wonderful posting, my many-talented sister!

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  2. I've never seen this tomato machine - Ted has me peeling them by hand.

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  3. peeling by hand?!
    no,no,no,no,no
    You can get these machines at Canadian Tire, I'm pretty sure.
    I think we got our's at Home Depot years ago.

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  4. Nice post, but i will like to know where to buy that machine please, i love Italian tomatoes for pasta.

    Thanks.

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