Canning Jars - Locally

I finally found a local hardware store that carries canning supplies!  So I stocked up with scooping up 3 cases! This hardware store only carries the jars once a year, and they don't carry that many cases.  If I had the space, I think I would have bought every single case.  hahaha.  I've complained about it before in previous blog posts.  It is so difficult to find canning jars in Staten Island.  The only place I was able to find them was AC Moore, but they charge $1.99 a jar.  Um, no way!  That would mean a case would cost $24!  Forgetaboutit!  I found these cases for $9.99. It's the same price as the Ball website, but at least I don't have to pay for shipping! 

Thank goodness I got the jars, because I have been busy canning the harvests.  I did a whole case of pint size jarred pickles.  And some heirloom tomato salsa.  Yum!  Canning season has begun!

I'll never go back to store bought!

Earlier in the season, I had a hard time finding canning jars that didn't break the bank. The only place I could find canning jars sold them for $1.99 a jar. Ouch. So when we went up to the family farm, my father-in-law told us that we could buy jars from the Amish for a great price. They buy in bulk so they get amazing prices. We were able to buy 4 cases of canning jars from them at $6.50 a case. Much better than $1.99 / jar!

So when we got home from our long trip, the next day, I was so excited to start making grape jelly!  We had processed all these concord grapes in jars at the farm.  I emptied out the grapes onto a strainer and smooshed the grapes with a spoon.  Since we had already can processed these grapes in a hot water bath already, the juice flowed pretty easily. 

Once we had 5 cups of liquid, we were ready to start making the jelly.

In the pot went the 5 cups of grape juice, and 1 box of pectin. Bring to a boil. Once boiling, add 4 cups of granulated sugar. Mix to dissolve sugar and bring back to a boil. Once it's boiling, time for 1 minute then turn off the burner.

Ladle the hot liquid into sterilized canning jars, leaving 1/4 inch of space at the top.  I was able to fill 3 1/2 pint jars.  Process the jars in a boiling hot water bath for 6 minutes.  Remove the jars from the boiling water and let it cool to room temperature. 

The hubs and I had to break into a jar the next morning at breakfast. And let me just tell you, BEST GRAPE JELLY ever! The taste was so grape concentrated and unbelievably incredible. And the fact that it only had 3 ingredients made me smile. This has definitely ruined me for life, I can NEVER go back to store bought jelly EVER AGAIN. Even though this was a lot of work to process the 4 bushels of grapes at the family farm, this jelly made it all worth it!   I can't wait until our grapevines hurry up and grow! We have one concord grapevine in the backyard. The other 3 grapevines are Reliance Pink, Seedless Glenora, and Cayuga. Does anyone know, can you make jelly out of any type of grapes or does it have to be Concord?

What do you do with a bushel of tomatoes?

A lot of the produce that is grown on my in-laws farm is sold at two local farmers markets in their area. Upon speaking with his dad, the hubs said to me that we could go out to the fields and harvest some Roma tomatoes because they were too ripe to sell at the market. Since there were more tomatoes than the family could use, he said we could take as much as we wanted because it was going to turn into compost. Nice!  Out to the fields we went and picked a bushel of tomatoes. 

What does one do with a bushel of really ripe tomatoes? Sauce here we come! I took half of the tomatoes, washed and removed all the skin by putting them in scalding water. This took a very long time to remove the skin. I do like my sauce without skin, but this was a long process. I think it took me 2 hours to wash the tomatoes and remove the skin off of half a bushel. I have to re-think whether or not I want to do that in the future. Maybe I can learn to like tomato peel in my sauce.

Half of a bushel filled two large stockpots, along with oregano, basil herbs grown from our garden.  I simmered the sauce for about 3 hours. 

This was my first time ever canning sauce so I was dreaming of lots and lots of cans that this would produce, however I forgot how reduced sauce gets when you cook it down.  In the end, all that work made only 5 quarts of sauce.  I laughed out loud, but it was a "All that work, and I can't believe I made only 5 quarts" laugh.  Haha.  My husband laughed and said, "It's so much easier to buy a jar from the supermarket".  He's right, but I think my sauce tastes better.  And it's 100% organic!

The following day, I took the other half a bushel and decided to make oven roasted tomatoes. I've read on many blogs about how incredibly tasty oven roasted tomatoes were.  I followed the recipe on Smitten Kitchen. Wash all the tomatoes and slice in half in a large mixing bowl, mix with olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic and fresh herbs.  This smelled amazing, I could eat it just like this!!

I lined the tomatoes on baking cookie trays lined with aluminum foil. Foil makes cleaning so much faster!

To maximize on oven space, I put a filled tray on each oven rack. Roast baby roast.

I guess my tomatoes were too large because it didn't take 3 hours for this babies to roast like it says in the recipe. It took mine 7 hours! LOL. I really don't think it's a good use of the energy it takes to run the oven.  I need to invest in a dehydrator!  Look how much the tomato shrunk?  I packed those tomatoes in, where they practically touched each other.  I love how much it shrunk.

I transferred the tomatoes onto plates to let them cool down to room temperature. I popped one in my mouth, and yes, the flavor is like an intense tomato.

All that work and it only made one quart jar of oven roasted tomatoes. (sigh) Maybe I should have stuck to making sauce! hahahahaha

Canning for Hours and Hours!

At the family farm, like any homestead, they do a LOT of canning. This is one of two shelves in the cellar. Isn't it amazing!! They are well stocked for the winter. Among the goodies, are peaches, tomato sauce, pears, jam, pickles, dilly beans, beets, chicken, chicken stock, and turnips!

This is the cupboard in the kitchen!  Nothing like canning organic food!  Nutritious and tasty.

At the farm, there are some things that they don't grow. One of them is grapes. So they buy from other farmers. The in-laws bought 4 bushels of concord grapes to make grape juice and grape jelly. I've never canned grapes before, so this was a new experience for me. The taste of these grapes were so sweet and delicious and the smell was intoxicating. Wow!

Processing 4 bushels of grapes is a lot of work. First, the grapes are washed in water.

Then we pick off all the grapes off the stem. This takes forever!

For some jars, we pile the grapes in to make concentrated grape juice for Jelly. When the grapes are in, top off the jar with about 1/2 cup of boiling water.

This is what it looks like after it's been processed with a boiling water bath. Isn't the color just amazing?  So rich!

After we finished the jars of concentrated grape juice for grape jelly, we moved onto making grape juice for drinking.  For this recipe, in a quart size jar, add 1 cup of grapes and 1/2 cup of sugar.  Fill with water and process.  

This is just some of the many, many jars we did. We did 65 quarts in total. How long did that take us? A whopping 8 hours! Let me tell you, when we were finished, I never wanted to see grapes ever again!