Gregg--Can I Get Your Directions for Canning Salsa?

[catherine]

Help! Tomatoes are starting to overtake our consumption.

I'm interested in a few pints of salsa--not 93.

Can you share your recipe, and also canning instructions? I'm a newbie at canning.

[Gregg]

Sure catherine! Our "recipe" varies depending on the amount of anything coming in at any given time. One constant is Mrs. Wages salsa spices from the grocery store. Its just plain good. We tried to be purists and make up our own spice mixes. They were good, but a hassle so we went full circle back to the handy packets. Other than that salsa is pretty basic.

Everything goes into a pot on the stove. Tomatoes, obviously. I freeze ours, the skins slip right off when they thaw out. We toss ours in the food processor for a second to end up with small chunks, but texture is only a matter of preference. We also salt, pepper and sugar them as soon as they hit the pot. Sorry I don't have any exact amounts, but just a good sprinkle of all three over them adds a nice depth to the final flavor. I also added tomatillos this year just because we have them in spades, but they are by no means a requirement.

Lots of onions, we like white onions, and some green bell pepper, both all chunked in food processor. Garlic. Lots of garlic. We just buy a jar of the stuff already chopped up and dump some in. Cilantro - when you think you have enough, double it. We food process that, stems and all, until it is pretty finely chopped up. We're kind of hot pepper freaks so use jalapenos, habaneros, Thai chilis and whatever other hot peppers are ripe, but that can obviously be adjusted up or down depending on your taste. One note, people shy away from habaneros because they ARE hot, but they also have an incredible flavor so think about tossing in at least one. We grind up the peppers pretty fine in the processor, no big chunks waiting to ambush someone.

Cook all that down until you have the consistency you want. We do the tomatoes first and cook off some of the water/juice because we like thicker salsa. By adding everything else after that the flavor stays nice and fresh. From there we just cook it all until the onions and peppers are a little soft, but not mushy. At the end we squeeze in the juice of one lime and add a couple tablespoons of white balsamic vinegar for every 6 pints of salsa. Adjust salt and pepper (and heat if necessary) at the end. We hot pack the jars and process at 15 # pressure for 20 minutes for pints and 28 minutes for quarts. You could probably water bath can this and be just fine, but since we overload all the non-acidic veggies we just figure better safe than sorry.

One other variation we did this year that is WONDERFUL is roasted salsa. Just like above only the tomatoes, onions and peppers all went in the oven until they were pretty charred up. I also put a couple drops of liquid smoke and a little cumin in that batch just to kick it up another notch. Everybody raved about that one for something a little different. Its perfect on DW mole' enchiladas. Hope that helps!

[catherine]

Thanks, Gregg! I'll give it a try!

[Tussiemussies]

Catherine you can also pick up the book "Ball Blue Book of Canning." It is the canning bible and has complete directions on how to can. I taught myself and look forward to looking over their recipes every year....Just FYI....

[iris lilies]

Timely! If you look at your Mrs. Wages salsa package, you'll see that it was manufactured in St. Louis. My friend was, until 2 months ago, the national director of marketing for Mrs. Wages and she gifted us a big basket of the stuff at Christmas time.

So we've got scads of tomatoes, too, and DH said that he was planning to make salsa this weekend since he's already completed canning tomatoes and juice. We are having a bumper crop this year. I'll print out Gregg's recipe and armed with that and our Mrs. Wages packet, we'll go to town with salsa.

[Gregg]

A big gift basket of Mrs. Wages spice mixes is along the lines of winning a new car on "The Price is Right". I know it would make me jump up and down and squeal like a school girl.

[pinkytoe]

It's interesting to read how you guys or y'all depending on where you're from make salsa. Down here, we mostly use canned tomatos since we don't have fresh much past June.
DH makes a "fresh" batch every week - adding chopped oniion, garlic, lime juice, cumin, serrano pepper and cilantro. Bell peppers or spice mixes never used in this neck of the woods.
If you want to add some interest, add a tablespoon of canned chipotle in adobe to the mix for a nice smoky flavor.

[catherine]

Well, looks like I can get Mrs. Wages in Walmart or TrueValue. I don't know where a TrueValue is in NJ, so unfortunately I have to brave WalMart. Wish me luck!

DH and I decided to make some salsa for DS and also give him some of our tomatoes.

Thanks for the recipe!

BTW, Gregg, I had never even heard of tomatillos until last year when they showed up in my CSA box. But I intuitively made tomatillo salsa and it was great.

[catherine]

Catherine you can also pick up the book "Ball Blue Book of Canning." It is the canning bible and has complete directions on how to can. I taught myself and look forward to looking over their recipes every year....Just FYI....

Thank you! I need all the help I can get. I'll check out the book.

[catherine]

OK, so here is what it's like to go buy Mrs. Wages Salsa Spices in New Jersey:

I waited through four lights just to get onto Route 1--they adjusted the timing on the lights so that only two cars got through at every green light. I got up there an parked out in the hinterlands because it was so crowded and walked (which is fine). I scoured every food aisle. They had one aisle that looked particularly promising, because it had all kids of spice mixes for chili and gravy, but no salsa.

So I asked one of the workers there where I might find it and she looked totally confused but brightened up when I said "salsa" so she directed me to Aisle 10. No Mrs. Wages. By then I figured that it might actually be where the canning stuff is, so I saw two other workers standing together felt very hopeful that if one didn't know, the other might.

So I asked, "Where is your canning stuff?" So one of them said, "Oh, scanners are at the end of Aisle 6." I said, "No, I said 'canning'" She looked at me strangely and then looked at her friend. "Canning?" I said. "You know, mason jars and stuff like that to preserve food?"

Honestly, by the look on their faces you would think I asked them where their joogly-ooglas were. So I asked again, "I'm looking for spices that you use for canning salsa." "Oh!" they said, "Salsa is in Aisle 10."

So I went on my own to find the canning stuff and finally found it in the Kitchen department. Bingo! They had Mrs. Wages Tomato Sauce Spices, Mrs. Wages Pickling Spices, but no salsa spice.

I was ready to give up when I started poking around on the top shelf, and there were two bags stuck way back! I looked around to find someone taller than me (which isn't hard), but no one was around. So I climbed up the shelves and retrieved one.

I guess if you live in NJ, "canning" means nothing more than the Can-Can sale they have at Shop-Rite once a year.

[Blackdog Lin]

catherine: thanks for your entertaining post. It brightened up my evening. :)

[iris lilies]

DH spent the afternoon making salsa. He make two kinds, "his" recipe and the on with Mrs. Wages' spices. The Mrs. Wages one is great!