Making and canning pasta sauce

Well it is certainly tomato season down here in NC! We have been picking, eating, canning and saucing our way through our garden GREAT bounty! This year we have made 2 batches (so far) of pasta sauce and we wanted to share our recipe and process with you all!

 

Supplies -

-Pressure Canner

-pot

-sieve

-blender

-jars with lids and rings

 

Ingredients:

-30lbs of tomatoes (we use mostly Roma)

-1-2 onions

-1 head of garlic

-1 cup of chopped celery or green peppers (we used peppers)

-4.5 tsp salt

-2 tbsp oregano

-4 tbsp. parsley

-2 tbsp. pepper

-red pepper flakes (optional, to taste)

-1/4c brown sugar

-vegetable oil

 

This recipe yields 7-9 quart jars depending on how thick you like the sauce.

 

The first step is to prep the tomatoes, there are two ways to do this. The method we use is, wash tomatoes then place in blender. Pour tomato goo into sieve and strain out skins and seeds. The second method is dip tomatoes in boiling water for 30-60 seconds or until the skins split. Then dip in iced cold water and slip skins off Remove the core and quarter the meat of the tomato.

 

One you have processed your tomatoes the way you would like, follow these directions to turn that goo into sauce!

 

-Sauté the vegetables in the vegetable oil until tender.

-Once tender, add tomato goo, spices and sugar.

-Bring to a boil.

-Simmer uncovered, until think enough for serving. Be sure to stir occasionally to prevent burning. This usually takes ALL day and then I like to let the sauce rest overnight (typically the sauce will have reduced by about half of the original volume). In the morning I then turn the sauce back on to prepare for canning.

-To can your sauce be sure it is heated through, you want to hot pack the jars. Fill the jars with the hot sauce, leaving about 1 inch of headspace. Wipe down rims and secure lids.

 

To process the jars:

-use your dial pressure canner to process jars at 11 pounds of pressure for, 20 minutes for pints and 25 minutes for quart jars. - or-

-use your weighted gauge pressure canner to process jars at 10 pounds of pressure for, 20 minutes for pints and 25 minutes for quart jars