Doing the Salsa
With the tomatoes ripening nicely, peppers in abundance and plenty of onions to use up, salsa making time came to our house. The last time I made salsa was during Covid in 2020 and we still have a few jars of that batch left over but probably not enough to last for the rest of the year. So I picked a bunch of tomatoes over several days and got the large stock pot out from the basement. Above you see about half the tomatoes stemmed and cut into chunks, ready to begin cooking down.
After they had cooked down a bit, I ran them through my mill to remove the skin and seeds and then returned them to the pot along with a large amount of onions and two different kinds of peppers. After getting them hot, I added a bit of sugar, vinegar, salt and prepped my jars for canning.
Once I ladled the boiling salsa into hot sterilized jars, I added the lids, bands and processed them in a hot water bath.
Once sterilized and heated through, I lined them up on the counter to cool and seal. In my childhood when my mom did a lot of canning, mis-seals were a fairly regularly thing but with today's manufacturing standards and the knowledge I learned from mom, I rarely get a mis-seal. My day of salsa was no exception and I ended up with 23 pints of salsa and not one jar that didn't seal. After leaving them on the counter a day to make sure everything had cooled completely, I labeled the jars and moved them down to our basement canning shelves to age for a half year or so while we use up our old salsa from the Covid age. Twenty-three pints should be enough to last us for a couple two or three years before I have to make another batch.
I regret that I never learned to dance the salsa. We just about had lesson set up once, but they fell through. I think we had a line dance that was at least somewhat salsa-ish. 😉😇
ReplyDeleteI always wanted to learn the jitterbug. Perhaps that demonstrates the age gap between us.
DeleteHomemade salsa--yum! I like it with chips, on eggs, on quesadillas, tacos, etc. It's so versatile!
ReplyDeleteIt certainly is. It is quite often a weekend snack for us with chips. But we do use it occasionally for things like tacos.
DeleteYou learned well...the jars look impressive!
ReplyDeleteFunny how I never really enjoyed helping mom when she was canning. But I grew to like it after getting out on my own.
DeleteYou make salsa a totally different way than I do! I don't cook mine and just make up a huge batch that we eat up long before it could possibly spoil. It's all done in the food processor.
ReplyDeleteThat might be hard to do in the wintertime here, at least with my own homegrown veggies. I should make more fresh salsa when everything is in season.
DeleteYep, those should last you a while! What do you eat it with?
ReplyDeleteMostly tortilla chips but occasionally we use it on tacos or other mexican type foods.
DeleteYou are a clever guy Ed. You can turn your hand to just about everything. With 23 pints of salsa you must be expecting a nuclear war!
ReplyDeleteOr a couple years without tomatoes. I personally hope it is my scenario and not yours!
DeleteThat salsa would never last 2 or 3 years around hear. It looks too good not to eat.
ReplyDeleteWe tend to go in streaks. We will eat several jars in quick succession and then a month or two will go by without opening one.
DeleteGreat job! I wish you were my neighbor.
ReplyDeleteI can understand, we give away a fair amount of our canned goods as gifts to friends and family.
DeleteThat's an excellent days work! Nothing more lovely than a countertop loaded with lovely home canned jars.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely!
DeleteTomorrow, I hope to begin making soup!
ReplyDeleteJust got done canning 24 pints of soup today myself.
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