Canning salsa

This past Saturday the Blue Moon Gardens Garden Club had a canning demonstration at Mary's house. It was a good place for it as 19 ladies came to see salsa being processed.

Margaret is filling jars with cooked salsa while Mary talks and heats up the jars before filling.

We got the recipe for this salsa from our former employee Tish. She had one name for it, we gave it the G-rated name Darn Good Salsa. The recipe makes about 9 -11 pints and my canner, the giant copper soup pot pictured above, holds only 7 pints at a time. There is always some left to eat right away.

Besides the water-bath pot and the cooking pot for the salsa, this is the only other equipment I use, except for a wire basket with handles that holds the 7 pint jars. It makes it easy to load and unload the jars into the boiling water. My favorite piece of equipment is the skinny blue thing in the upper left corner. It has a magnet on the round end to pick up hot jar lids. Sweet.

Here's the finished product. I cooked and canned for 3 days prior to the demo so everyone had a jar to take home with them. Here is the recipe if you would like to try this at home. It is one of many great recipes in our Harvest of Seasons - Summer cookbook. Call us if you would like us to mail you a copy for only $15.

Darn Good Salsa

30 fresh tomatoes, peeled and seeded or 2 six-pound cans of peeled, diced tomatoes, drained

20 jalapenos, chopped (remove seeds if you want a mild salsa)
3 cups onions, chopped
5 cloves garlic, minced
1 ½ tablespoons salt
1 to 2 tablespoons sugar
1 cup white vinegar
1 bunch cilantro, chopped

Combine all ingredients except cilantro in a food processor. Pulse on and off until chopped but still chunky. Pour into a large soup pot. Boil for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally, Simmer 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat and add cilantro. Fill 8 pint-sized steralized jars and store in refrigerator or process in a water bath for 10 minutes.