Canning Season Newbie

[KamilaRose]

Hello Everyone,
I m new here I wanna ask a few questions hopefully you guys can help and I also help you if anyone needs my help,
anyways,

This my first year Canning we have about 300-400 Tomatos plants and other vegetable and would like some advice on canning we have plan to put in jars about half of all our vegetable, this is family tradition i m very happy to be part as growing up all i remember was smashing tomato in the garage with my nano and nona, so this year is my turn to introduce to my family but before i do i have to make sure i m doing the right thing and thats why i m here asking for some canning advice and also what machine should we be looking at because the smashing days are over 2016 now everything is automatic please feel free add a comment if you plant for canning and if you have any question or need help with planting we living on 50 acres so planting we know best thanks

good day everyone!

 

[Chuck]

My garden is a tad over 1/4 acre and when I plant the entire thing and have good harvests canning gets to be a chore. My first pressure canner was a Mirror 23 quart. I let it run dry of water and it warped the bottom so now it doesn't pressurize. But it makes a better water bath canner than you can find. It holds 16 pints and I use it for all of my acidic vegetables like tomatoes and for pickling. The pressure canner I have now is a 23 quart Presto. I don't like it as well as I liked the Mirror. The Mirror is a much more heavy duty canner than the Presto and it has a 3-way wobbler instead of a set 15# wobbler on the Presto. The Presto has a gauge and the pressure is adjusted by the amount of heat. On the Mirror the wobbler is either 5# 10# or 15#. You don't have to mess around with turning up or down the heat to maintain proper pressure.

With the size of your garden you will need more than one pressure canner. I sometimes need at least two, especially when the corn and green beans come in at the same time. There is a time lag because of the initial heating and bringing up to the correct pressure plus the cooking time and cooling period. You can't just do a batch and turn around and do another. On a good day I can put by 3 batches or 48 pints of something and sometimes I really need another canner in order to maintain freshness of my produce. Of course you could do more than me if you had help with the initial preparation such as washing jars, boiling lids and preparing the produce.

Something else that I find as a must have is a food mill. You can easily do a hundred pounds of tomatoes for sauce or paste in no time at all. No pre-boiling or peeling needed.

 

[Durgan]

I pressure can all and sundry as a slurry. This simplifies the process. Tomatoes are not in quantity for 2016 yet.

Tomatoes IMO it is difficult to have too many. I only have ~40 plants and expect over 100 liter jars of strained slurry. Over the season I pressure can about 500 liters of various.
This is my typical method.

http://www.durgan.org/2015/August%202015/24%20August%202015%20Tomato%20Juice/HTML/index.htm 24 August 2015 Tomato Juice
Forty pounds of tomatoes were made into 14 liters of juice. No water was added. Some available basil, egg plant and sweet pepper was used. Tomatoes were washed, quartered, cooked until soft, hand blended into a slurry, strained, then pressure canned at 15 PSI for 15 minutes. Pictures depict the process.

 

[gary350]

I have been canning garden vegetables for 45 years. Tomatoes are the only thing is the garden that you do not need to pressure can because they have acid in them, exception is low acid tomatoes. We have canned 101 pint jars of tomatoes so far. Water bath boil 20 minutes for pints and 30 minutes for quarts.

There is a lot of good tomato flavor in the skins, I never remove skins. Do not trust what you read in books and do not truck what other people say. You need to can a few tomatoes to learn the process and what works best.

Make sure jars are clean, no chips, no crack, no need to boil jars before you CAN they are going to get boiled anyway so why do double work, no need to boil them twice. Waste of time.

FLAVOR. If you remove the skins you loose a lot of flavor. If you buy tomato juice at the grocery store you get tomatoes with skins removed. If you buy tomato sauce at the grocery store you get tomatoes with skins and seeds blended into the tomatoes you can do that in your kitchen blender. If you buy tomato paste at the grocery store your getting tomato skins ground into paste.

I use to remove skins to make paste, I made juice, and sauce too. That was a lot of work. Not any more now I blend the skins and seeds into the tomatoes and make all sauce. If you cook then you soon learn tomato sauce is all you really need in the kitchen.

1. I wash and slice my tomatoes, put them all in a large pots and bring it to a boil for 5 minutes. Stir well then let them set on the stove to cool naturally about 150 degrees while you get ready to put tomatoes in jars.

2. Put 4 pots of water on the stove and turn it on, let it heat up while you put tomatoes in jars.

3. Use a canning jar funnel to fill clean jars 1/2" from the top. Double check glass edges for chips while you wipe edges clean before putting on the seals and rings. Tighten the lid and place the 150 degree tomato jars in the 150 degree water pots. I Never add vinegar tomatoes have their own acid. I never add salt, pepper or herbs either you can not remove it later if the recipe does not call for that.

4. When all the jars are full and in the pots make sure water level in the pots are all 1/2" to 1" above the jar lids. Turn on the heat but NOT on high. You want to jars to heat up to a boil over a period of about 20 to 30 minutes so set the dial at about 3/4 turn.

5. When water bath starts to boil time for 20 minutes with the lid on top of the boil pots. No need to do a hard boil, turn the heat down slightly if you need to. After 20 minutes turn the heat off and let the pots cool naturally. In about 2 hours I return to the kitchen to remove the jars and dump the water.

6. Rinse cold room temperature jars, dry lids, put the DATE on the lids with a black marker.

When your cooking you can use the tomatoes the way they are or, if you want skins and seeds chopped into the juice to make sauce dump a jar of tomatoes into the kitchen blender for 30 seconds. If you want skins and seeds removed for juice pour a jar through a strainer. If you want to double the tomato flavor add the skins and seeds you removed from 1 jar to a second jar of tomatoes.

We have 74 pints of tomatoes, we are going to do 20 quarts next.

 

[KamilaRose]

Omg Gary thank you so much!!! love all the pictures i cant wait we are so excited about this season canning.
so far outer all the place i been looking for help you have made the best post WOW.. thank you

 

[KamilaRose]

Gary since you know so much about canning my husband & I bought a milling machine online is next week by UPS, is made by Fabio Leonardi let me know what you think http://www.consiglioskitchenware.com

 

[KamilaRose]

here the direct link gary: https://www.consiglioskitchenware.c...i-MR2-1-3-HP-SP2-Tomato-Machine-1687p4359.htm

I see you dont really used a machine you think is will be a faster process using a machine or following your instructions will be good enough let me know asap I may have time to cancel the order.

Honestly thank you not even all the youtube video are so helpful like you.

 

[KamilaRose]

I wish I can say gary i will share some sauce with you !! Thanks one Million time really love your process.

 

[gary350]

The only machine I use is the kitchen blender to puree the skins and seeds into liquid to make tomato sauce. If you can find a reasonable price machine that works good or better that would be great. We do yard sales all the time I bought 3 kitchen blenders so far this month $2 each. This helps speed things up.

NOTE: Make sure your water bath boil pots have those metal spacer things in the bottom that keep the glass jars from touching the bottom of the pot. If you put glass jars directly on the hot bottom of the pot it will sometimes break the glass jars. Pressure cookers all come with those metal spacer things in the bottom.