Salsa-thon 2021

[JRinPA]

Salsa-thon 2021 is complete! Finished up with 57 pints sealed.

I grew big beef and estiva, both hybrids, 27 total plants, specifically to replenish the salsa supply that was finished off early this summer. They are both fairly round and blemish free, making them easy to skin and squeeze.

I had waited until they were pretty ripe, both for sweeter tomatoes, and as a delaying action - the hot peppers were not ready. Finally, I could wait no longer and picked a few days ago. Seven 1020 trays filled to bending. There was some loss from the delay - probably lost another tray's worth over the course of waiting. I had avoided picking ANY of these, except obvious splits/goners, because I wanted them all at once for a salsa cook. The night of picking I milled any damaged or suspect tomatoes, and used peroxide spray (thanks [mention]GoDawgs[/mention] ) on the better ones, and stashed them in 15 gallon grow bags in the kitchen. I figured they would hold in breathable grow bags. It was two days ago that I got back to the tomatoes, and all were still fine except for two on outside edges that looked looked like they were struck by bumping feet, not tomato weight. It took almost two hours to skin them all, with a two stage/four active tomato process. Two at a time in the pot, then those two staged to the cool water and two replacements in the hot pot, the cool ones slipped, cut in half, seeds squeezed out, and put in colander. Repeat for 20 gallons worth! (I specify because previous years I would try 4-5-however many in the pot and that varied greatly the heat transfer. Two at a time was very efficient.) Then during the long delay while they drained, we had buy to onions, some tomato paste, and lime juice, but all the sauce, tomatoes, peppers, and garlic were garden grown.

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Fifty-seven of sixty pints sealed. One jar did not seal from batch#1, that I only BWB for 10 minutes. I crushed the ring (cheap insurance), upped to 12 minutes, used the both the jar and lid separately in batch#3; both sealed. I tossed 3 jars total that I noticed nicks or chips on the rim, before their BWB. After the first nonseal, all went smooth until two from batch#6 failed at the end. I thought I would have 59/60, but 57/60 is still pretty good. I put their contents back in the pot with the excess, so about 3 quarts total that I may yet can.

There are plenty more to pick, or will be next week, but I'm not sure if I should make anymore salsa. Maybe some hotter stuff. Ripe habanero hot... The last salsa cook was 2018. The last can from it was used in June, still good, but I can't recall how many were made in 2018, probably 3-4 dozen. Salsa gets eaten in bunches here, and then none for months at a time.

[JRinPA]

Forgot to add,
bad jars - we got our jars from various sources, many from friends that no longer can. One type seems to get a lot of nicks. Mom's. It says Mom's on top and a picture of "Mom" and below it say Mason Jar. They are short and square/rounded corners and only hold about 14 oz. I have probably retired between 25%-50% of the total of these I have seen, due to chips or cracks.

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Sad, because they make me laugh, the picture of Mom reminds me of an arcade game they had in a restaurant in town when I was a kid. The game was called "Granny and the Gators". It was granny in a pirogue whacking gators with a paddle. Maybe she had a load of tomatoes to deliver?
Found it!

[friedgreen51]

Good looking salsa. Would you post your recipe?
Thanks

[JRinPA]

http://www.tomatoville.com/showpost.php ... ostcount=9

Quote:
Originally Posted by brokenbar View Post
Salsa
8 cups tomatoes, peeled, seeds removed, chopped and drained in colander for 6 hours.
2 cups chopped onion
1 cup chopped green pepper
3 -5 peppers of your choice
6 cloves minced garlic
2 tsp cumin
2 tsp pepper
1/8 cup sea salt
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1/3 cup sugar
1 cup lime juice
16 oz. tomato sauce
16 oz tomato paste
Mix all ingredients except tomatoes and cilantro, bring to a boil, boil 10 minutes. Add tomatoes and cilantro pour into hot jars, water bath canner for 15 minutes for pints. I am at sea level.
Makes 6 pints


Up to 1000 ft. Processing time is 15 minutes.
1001 - 3000 ft. Increase processing time an extra 5 minutes to 20 minutes total.
3001 - 6000 ft. Increase processing time an extra 10 minutes to 25 minutes total.
6001 - 8000 ft. Increase processing time an extra 15 minutes to 30 minutes total.
8001 - 10,000 ft. Increase processing time an extra 20 minutes to 35 minutes total.

I'll add that headspace for salsa is usually listed at 1/4" to 1/2".

I used to see the recipe posted as Annie's Salsa, 10 years back or so, but it was apple cider vinegar. The vinegar did not sound good. Brokenbar on tville posted a recipe that was similar but used lime. It sounded so good that way, I had to try making it.

The onions, garlic, peppers, and hot peppers are run through the food processor. I don't use the cilantro but I do use more peppers. Each double batch had about 5 romani, 12-15 anaheims, 9 jalapeno, and 1 green habanero. I added some tasteless citric acid to balance the peppers, 1 tsp per batch (7 pints). So I do a double batch in a 12qt pot, can 10 pints, put the remainder to an 8qt pot, repeat, and then the third canner load is the two remainders. 3/8" headspace and 12 minutes, then 5 min wait. I can't see the boil in the presto pressure canner, so it was probably more like 15-20. But at least 12 minutes at really full steam vent through the removed overpressure plug.

I just looked for Annie's salsa recipe now, and I see various recipes called Annie's, so who knows how many Annie's have put a salsa recipe up in the last 10 years.

[pondgardener]

[mention]friedgreen51[/mention] Here is a very popular one that I use, changing the ratio of non-acidic vegetables to make it hotter or milder, but keeping the total amount of non-acidic vegetables intact. The sugar can be left out, as well as the cilantro, and equal amounts of 5% lemon juice or lime juice can be substituted for the vinegar. Keep in mind that the minimum time in a boiling water bath(BWB) is 15 minutes at elevations under 1000 feet, with additional time added for higher elevations. And it is only approved for canning in pints.

http://www.justtherightsize.net/2013/09 ... salsa.html

[worth1]

Salsa and sauce are interchangeable to me being so close to Mexico and the Spanish language.
Looks really nice.

[bjbebs]

I can vouch for the Brokenbar recipe. I use something very similar. I like this recipe because the tomatoes are just heated through before going into jars and no vinegar. Plus, I up the hot pepper dose.
Here's my wife's go to salsa without the jalapeño. Sweet without heat is preferred over mine by most folks who have tried both.
Seems blasphemous to make salsa without a kick.

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[friedgreen51]

Thanks everyone for posting your salsa recipes. Lots of good ideas.

[JRinPA]

The remainder was just shy of 5 quarts. I canned 8 more pints, 10 minutes @ 5lb pressure, and left a quart in the fridge for the week.

It is good to have salsa again...when the stock ran out earlier this year, I actually tried to reduce some of my thin chili sauce quarts to use as salsa. The double boiler was dug out...it reduced, but it definitely had a well cooked taste after that. Not burnt, but cooked, and not what I wanted. The chili sauce right from the jar tastes fresh and lively, but it is too thin for dipping.

[Rockoe10]

Are these made by pressure canning? How long do yours keep?

All the guys at work loved the salsa i made up. So, i decided to scale it up. One off my coworkers wanted to try it out too, so we made two of these puppies! I can't wait for it to finish.

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[JRinPA]

What does it need to do to finish?

Are these made by pressure canning? How long do yours keep?

I only did the remainder that was in the fridge for a few days at 5lb pressure. It was 95% for convenience, maybe 5% peace of mind. The first 6 canner loads were bwb.

My last batch was 2018 vintage, water bath. I opened the last jar late June 2021, and it was good as new as far as I can tell. I didn't have a bad jar in the run. Been a long time since I had a jar of anything on the shelf come open or go bad, since most of my canning is 10lb pressure. I only do water bath for salsa and sweet pickled peppers, typically.

If you do them at 5 lb like I did this remainder, they see a lot of heat:
10min at 212F after the seal comes up (equalization time),
7 minute while it rises to 5lb (actually 7lb with presto rocker),
10 minutes at 5 lb= 228f?,
then cool down takes 20 minutes for the seal to drop.
So that is 47 minutes at 212F or above. Rather overkill for salsa. They will keep plenty long on the shelf, but the quality will not be as good as the 15-20 minute bwb at 212f. I marked these as [PC 5#], and when their time comes they may well go for chili rather than chips.