Salsa Canning Fun!

Canning season is here!  I'm excited to have found time to make salsa.  My Mother-In-Law offered to help when they were here with us to celebrate Emily's birthday over the weekend.  It was fun getting to use the same recipe she and my sister-in-law used just the weekend before.

Ingredients:
5 qts tomatoes, peeled and chopped
2 cups jalapenos, roasted and peeled (1 1/2 cup jalapeno and 1/2 cup dynamite)
3 cups mixed peppers, peeled and diced (Pueblo and Anaheim green chile mix)
4 cups chopped onion
7 cloves garlic
1 cup vinegar
3 tablespoons canning salt
Once all combined - cook on low for around 1 1/2 - 2 hours until it reaches the desired consistency.  It took us about 2 hours.  (There were extra tomatoes so we added another 1/2 of the recipe to the pot.)

We did some work the night before to give ourselves a head start:
Diced the onions
Roasted, peeled and chopped the jalapenos and green chiles

                                     Go Time!                                                 30 minutes in

                         90 minutes simmering away                        2 hours - it's canning time!

Start the water in the water bath kettle:
This will take some time to come to a boil - took us about 30 minutes.  There needs to be enough water to make sure it will cover the jars by an inch or two.

Get the jars ready:
Open each jar - putting the rings and lids in a small saucepan to simmer and cleaning the jars in soapy water.

Microwave sterilization:
Fill each jar 1/4 of the way with water and put in the microwave.  You can fit 6 jars in the microwave at one time.  Cook on high 2 minutes.

To make sure all of it is sterilized you gently swirl the water around the sides.  We did this over the water bath and then dumped the hot water in the water bath.  It was handy dumping it right in the water bath because the microwave was right above it and the jars are pretty hot.

Now it's time to fill the jars:
To be sure to keep the rims of the jars clean- we used a funnel when pouring in the salsa.  After filling the jar within 1/4 of an inch from the top (it's important they are filled pretty close to the top) we used a towel to clean around the rim again just to make sure it stayed clean before putting on the lid and ring.

Betty uses a magnet at the end of a green stick to help fish the lid and ring out of the simmering pot.  Worked like a charm and fun to boot.  You could also probably use tongs.

Once the lid and ring are in place and the ring has been tightened (closed but not super tight) you can use jar lifters to lower the jar into the water bath.  We fit  9 jars in Betty's water bath.  Using pint size jars we set the timer for 15 minutes to process. (Quart size would be 20 minutes and smaller jelly jars would be 10 minutes.)

You may need to remove some of the water if it has risen too high by time the jars were all added to the water bath.  Also keep an eye on the boil... it should be gently boiling but not enough for the jars to be moving around.

After the 15 minutes is done - a jar lifter is used to remove each of the jars and put on a baking rack to cool.  You will start hearing the lids snapping shut pretty fast.  If one doesn't snap you can throw it in the fridge and enjoy it that night.  We had one later that night along with some bean dip... I loved getting to the end and getting to sample.

                                                                    14 jars in total!

Have a great day!  Thanks for stopping by.