Adventures in Salsa Making

Happy Friday! I've been working on this post all week! I knew starting this blog would add another thing for me to do, so I might not get to it every day. But, for those of you who are interested in making and canning salsa, here's how our big Salsa Making Day went!

First off, there are a few lessons we learned...

1. You always seem to need more chili peppers, so buy more.  We were pulling them out of the freezer and even resorted to canned by the end of the day!  If you end up with extra, just peel, seed and chop them anyway.  Freeze them for next time!
2. SIT DOWN!  No, not right now, I mean when you are having a canning day (no matter what you are canning)... If you want to save your feet and back, do all the chopping sitting at your kitchen table.  This means that when your friends arrive to can with you, don't dump all the stuff they bring on the table! 
3. Never ever, under any circumstances, attempt a big canning day without an extra supply of Diet Coke!  Ha ha ha ha ha!  I was ready to do just about anything for a Diet Coke by the end of the day, and I wasn't the only one!

Okie dokie... with those little guidelines out of the way.  Here's how our day really went.

We had planned to get started just after 7:00 am, but we really didn't get going until almost 9:00.  Chalk it up to trying to get stuff done before we went to Alyson's and the yakking we did when we first got there.  Oh well.  Of course, I forgot half of what I needed and had to run back home and get things.  Luckily Alyson only lives a couple of blocks away from me.

We decided to divide up the duties which worked quite well.  I highly recommend it.  We had an Onion Chopping Station manned by Destiny, a Chili Chopping Station manned by Me, and a Tomatillo Chopping Station manned by Alyson.  After the Tomatillos were chopped Alyson moved to the Tomato Blanching Station.  After all the onions were chopped, (thanks to the Onion Chopper my mom gave once.  I love that thing.) Destiny switched to the Tomato Peeling Station.  Then they both merged into the Tomato Seeding and Chopping Station.  In the meantime, I gave myself a nice blister chopping all those chilis!  But that was fine by me, I'd rather have a blister than handle raw tomatoes about any day.

Our tomatoes were surprisingly meaty considering they were the round kind.  We got 7-8 quarts of chopped tomatoes out of a 20 pound box.  We decided to use my favorite salsa recipe, after all, which is normally used with Roma Tomatoes.  These ones seemed firm enough to give it a try.  I'll list the recipe below.  We piled up Mount Tomato in a giant bowl while we worked.  It was kind of like building a sand castle.

We varied the kinds of chilis we used.  In one batch we used poblano and jalapeno chilis.  In another we used anaheim, jalapeno, and habanero chilis.  The last batch was by the book and we used anaheim and jalapeno chilis.  It was fun to try the different varieties and see how the flavor changed.  The poblano and anaheim chilis all had to be roasted and peeled.  That's kind of a pain, but doable.  The skins on the jalapeno and habanero is thinner and you don't have to peel them. 

Meanwhile, picture all our children going crazy running around the house and backyard.  Thank goodness we live in Arizona and it was a beautiful day!  We even managed to remember to feed them lunch.  Impressive!

By about 5:00 pm we were pretty wiped out and were faced with 1 1/2 boxes of tomatoes.  We made up a batch and send it home with Destiny.  She was just soooo exhausted.  Alyson and I cranked through one box of tomatoes with the help of her wonderful hubby Chris.  We made up our batch and I took half of it home to finish up there.   I also took the last of the tomatoes to try making spaghetti sauce with (maybe tomorrow). 

The easiest part of the day was probably the actual canning part!  If you use a pH tested recipe like the one we used from the NCFHP website, then you can water bath can the jars.  15 minutes in the canner and they were done! 

The next day we met back up at Alyson's and exchanged jars.  All total we made 52 pints.  Pretty amazing, if you ask me.  And tasty, too!  I'm going to crack open my first pint at Game Night at the Davidson's tonight.  Yummmmm!

Don't they look pretty?

One last thing, Alyson saved up the tomato cores and seeds in a bowl while we were working.  I gave her my juicer to try juicing the leftovers.  She ended up with three quarts of tomato juice out of the stuff we normally would throw away!  Talk about Provident Living!!!!

Okay, here's the recipe.  This recipe comes from the National Center for Home Food Preservation website.  You can read the original recipe by clicking on the title below.

Tomato Salsa with Paste Tomatoes - printable version

7 quarts peeled, cored, chopped paste tomatoes

4 cups seeded, chopped long green chiles
5 cups chopped onion
½ cup seeded, finely chopped jalapeño peppers
6 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 cups bottled lemon or lime juice
2 tablespoons salt
1 tablespoon black pepper
2 tablespoons ground cumin (optional)
3 tablespoons oregano leaves (optional)
2 tablespoons fresh cilantro (optional)

Note: This recipe works best with paste tomatoes. Slicing tomatoes require a much longer cooking time to achieve a desirable consistency.

Yield: About 16 to 18 pints

Hot Pack: Combine all ingredients except cumin, oregano and cilantro in a large saucepot and heat, stirring frequently, until mixture boils. Reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add spices and simmer for another 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. Ladle hot into clean, hot pint jars, leaving ½-inch headspace. Remove air bubbles and adjust headspace if needed. Wipe rims of jars with a dampened, clean paper towel; apply two-piece metal canning lids. Process in a boiling water canner  for 15 minutes (adjust for altitude).

A word of note: Don't mess with the recipe beyond chaging types of peppers or the amount of seasonings and herbs.  You don't want to change the acidity of the salsa to be less acid (more vegetables than tomatoes will do this).  Less acid will mean that the salsa is unsafe to can with a water bath canner.

There you go... Salsa Making Day was amazing and exhausting!  I'll report on how the pasta sauce turns out next week! 

Thanks for playing!
Jan