Tomato Canning Day

Like with the sweet potatoes, I patiently waited for Roma tomatoes to hit a price that made it worth canning them myself.  Smart & Final had 25 pound cases for $15 the same week that it was announced tomato prices would be rising soon.  I've never bought a case of tomatoes for myself before, only for work, but it was coming home.  Also, the timing meant that anything which didn't seal would be easy to use with what was on the meal plan for the rest of the month.

I was not looking forward to peeling half of them.  You have to peel canned tomatoes.  Fine, 50 peeled tomatoes.  I was just glad that the ones being turned into sauce could be cooked with them on.

They had condensation on them from being refrigerated, so the first thing I did was lay them all out on a towel on the dining room table.  The intention was to put the more ripe ones on the left and the ones that needed some time in a paper bag on the right.  None of them were really unripe, so I just put another towel over the less-ripe ones for two days to get everyone to the same point.

Tomatoes can be water bath canned or done in the pressure canner.  I decided that the volume of product I was making would be easier in the pressure canner because I could stack them and do a single run.  The USDA book and NCHFP have charts for both types and varying pressures.  Both types of processing require the addition of citric acid or lemon juice.  Technically, tomatoes are acid foods, but they're on the border and there's no industry standard of acidity for variety or ripeness.  It's a blanket requirement of just barely enough acid to ensure safety.  Even commercially canned tomatoes contain citric acid.

I buy no salt, petite diced when I pick up cans.  There is no safe, tested method for diced tomatoes at home, but you don't have to add salt.  I'm doing quartered and will chop them up as needed before using.  

This really was one of the things on my list when I first bought the pressure canner.  A fifteen minute processing time, even with all the other procedures that go into pressure canning, still beats 35 minutes in water that took over an hour to get to a boil.  Also, the tomato guidelines are more forgiving.  There's a five-pound time, so if the canner falls below 10 pounds you can just add five more minutes and it's still safe.  It also uses far less water and isn't as messy to clean up if jars siphon.

I probably shouldn't have done this on a work day.  I started a little after 1pm and finally pulled the jars out shortly before seven.  A lot of that time was peeling the half case of tomatoes, reducing the tomato sauce, and at least half an hour running the sauce pieces through the food mill.  I reduced it too much, and only got three jars.  I have re-branded them unflavored pizza/pasta starter and will season them when I open one.  The one that didn't seal is going in the next post.  All the quartered tomatoes sealed, so there's my year's worth of canned tomatoes.  I finally ran through all my Ball/Kerr regular mouth lids and opened the ForJars.  They seem of good quality.  The one fail was probably over-filled or not wiped well.

I stopped with about a dozen tomatoes left in the box.  I was out of room in the two stock pots I had going.  They turned into oven-dried tomatoes.  The pulp left from milling the sauce is in the freezer.  I'm going to try dehydrating it and turning it into tomato powder, which can then be reconstituted into tomato paste.  I have seen it done, but never tried it myself.

So, was it worth the $15?  If you're counting the value of what's on the shelf and in the freezer, I did save money compared to buying cans and jars of product.  The six hours of work and utilities to process the tomatoes is where it would have been cheaper to buy cans.  I'm glad I have this skill, and six hours a year isn't that big a deal when you think about it.  It probably gets easier after you've done it a few times.