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| 9 pints and 7 quarts of green tomato sauce |
I had planned to put the sauce in the freezer, but we have a small freezer, and all the freezer bags wouldn't fit, so I canned it. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew you shouldn't water bath can tomato sauce that had zucchini in it, it should be pressure canned. We have a totally electric house so I have no pressure canner /cooker.
I spent all day on the sauce, which looked like green enchilada sauce, and canned it well into the night. The next day, looking at my sauce, I got to worrying about the canning method. I researched it, and researched it some more, only to find I was right. Even though I cooked it and boiled the pints for 45 minutes and the quarts for 50 minutes, it was the wrong method. So, instead of risking botulism, I added it all to the compost pile. It also didn't smell very good. Oddly enough, the deer didn't touch it.
I am new at this canning business, so it's all a learning experience anyway. Too bad I wasted all day doing it, but better safe than sorry. The tomatoes were so hard and green, they wouldn't have ripened up before spoiling, anyway, so I figure, except for the time, it was no great loss.
Next year, I'm wondering if I can use propane and the base of Tim's yet unused turkey fryer, get a pressure canner and try that? No, I wouldn't be using the fryer part, just the base that you set it on. Then again, I did find an electric pressure cooker/canner. I think I will probably opt for the electric method.
Here is a bathtub full of 138 pounds of potatoes. I rinsed all the dirt off of them outside in the wheel barrow, and the only place I could think of to put them in once they were in the house, was the bathtub in the extra bathroom.
They are out of the bathtub now, and I have dehydrated and frozen a lot of them. Now, I have them in a milk crate in the pantry and the small ones are in 2 boxes in the dining room and a stainless steel bowl on the kitchen counter.
They are very good potatoes, but the small ones are not going to last very long, so those are the ones that are getting used first.
Tomorrow, or this weekend, I will tell you what I have been doing with the dehydrated potatoes and how I am freezing them.
That is truly a first in my life. A bathtub full of potatoes. BRAVO eat 'em up.
ReplyDeleteThis might be a dumb question, but what does having a totally electric house have to do with using a pressure canner/cooker? I do have a gas cooktop, but my pressure canner can be used on any type of stove.
ReplyDeleteI have the smooth glass top electric stove and most manufacturers say not to use them because they can get too hot and crack. You also have to have more than one burner on so you can switch burners to regulate the heat and pressure since the electric burners don't cool down like gass burners. Most stove manufactureers say don't even use a water bath canner because the amount of time you have to have the heat on high can cause the cooktop to crack. I looked in my owner's book, and it said it was ok to water bath can. For the water bath canners, you are only suppose to use flat bottom ones, but mine is the regular kind and it works just fine.
ReplyDeleteI did just read on the internet that you can use a flame tamer which is suppose to make it ok to use a pressure cooker on my stove.
ReplyDeleteI would still go with the electric pressure cooker. Forget the propane turkey fryer base. Sounds dangerous.
ReplyDeleteMy aunt, who has been canning for years, uses one of those stoves and before we moved to our new house, I also used one of those smooth glass top stoves. It never cracked, and I've never swapped back and forth between burners. I've actually never even heard or thought of doing that! I thought the only reason they recommended you not using them on those is because it would scratch it if you slid the canner, which I always picked up anyways.
ReplyDeleteMaybe next year I'll give it a try. Of course, I'll have to get a pressure cooker. The only information I had was from stove manufacturers and canning sites.
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