Killer Tomatoes

Since we have an abundance of tomatoes, we have been thinking of what to do with them. We have given several away to Orem residents in the area where they are not allowed to grow anything (the area includes DeeAnn's school due to a bug infestation). Our latest brainwave was to make salsa. After searching for a descent recipe that was fast and tasty, I can across one at recipezarr (for a copy of the recipe, contact us--I removed the link after discovering their site tries to install spyware) that looked like it met the requirements (though we cut the cumin to 1 1/2 tsp).

So, yesterday we picked all our ripe tomatoes and went shopping for the ingredients. This morning, we spent the past 2 1/2 hours making and canning salsa! DeeAnn had the pleasure of peeling the skins off the tomatoes and chopping the jalapeño peppers while I blanched the tomatoes, chopped the onions, green peppers, garlic, and mixed it all together. DeeAnn supervised the canning process so that I would not burn myself.

Only apparently, I don't know how to measure. I realized that I had doubled the portions of salt. I was using the 1/4 measuring cup, intending on halving it for the required 1/8 cup, but must have been distracted. Oops! Despite the extra salt, it still tastes good.

Once the 7 pints have cooled off, I'll check them out to see if the flavor of the salt has lessened. If not, we have plenty of tomatoes for a new batch next week (and the week after that, and the week after that...)! It might also help to have a low-salt chip for dipping or to use it in a recipe.

We also learned that tomatoes are very juicy and slimy! So we tried to de-juice them by hand as well as we could, along with de-seeding them. That helped make the salsa a little less runny. But the consistency looks very good. So, live and learn!

Next canning projects (assuming we don't have to re-do the salsa), will be homemade spaghetti sauce (start sending your recipes to us now) and peaches. YUM!