How to: Seasoned Tomato Sauce

Please note this recipe is from the Blue Ball Ball Blue Book of Preserving.

Comments and snarkiness are all me! 

Ingredients:

• 
  
  45 pounds tomatoes                                                
• 
  
  6C chopped onions
• 
  
  12 cloves garlic, minced
• 
  
  1/2C olive oil
• 
  
  2T oregano
• 
  
  6 bay leaves
• 
  
  1T black pepper
• 
  
  1 1/2T sugar
• 
  
  PATIENCE
• 
  
  1/4C salt
• 
  
  bottled lemon juice

 

Saute onions and garlic in olive oil in large saucepan.

Looks good right? Smells good too!








Now here's the bitch fun, remove core and blossom ends of 45 pounds of tomatoes then quarter them, this is a lot of work, and MESSY!

Then add the tomatoes,oregano, bay leaves, black pepper, salt, and sugar.
Simmer for 20 minutes, uncovered, stirring occasionally.

Remove bay leaves and puree using a food processor. Now if you're lucky like me, the nice hot liquid tomato juice will pour down the side of the food processor and run all over your counter and floor before you notice. Be prepared for a mess!


Then strain puree to remove seeds and peels. I used a fine mesh strainer, which did not work well at all. I also tried cheesecloth, that sucked too, then I tried my spaghetti colander which worked ok but let in lots of seeds and peels. At this point I did not care, so I  proceeded with the strainer and seeds and peels.....

Cook the pulp, uncovered, on med-high heat until sauce thickens. Stir occasionally to prevent sticking. Reduce volume by half (this part took about 6 hours).

In the meantime, clean up your kitchen (this could take awhile), and prepare your canning jars.

Place 2T lemon juice into each quart jar. Funnel sauce into jars leaving 1/2 inch headspace. Adjust caps. Process quarts for 40 minutes in boiling-water canner.

And then proceed to promise yourself that you'll never make sauce again when you realize all that work and mess made 9 jars of sauce!!

Although, it does taste pretty good....