The Triumphant Return of the "Free Gazette" Man!

"Have a Gazette! Wipe your windows!"

I smiled. He was back...

"Make fire!"

...and in fine form, it seemed,

which reminds me that it's Hallowe'en, which in turn means that I should be canning every last fruit and vegetable that I can get my hands on before Montreal goes sub-zero. Red and green tomatoes? Check. Chili peppers? Check. Fig, vanilla bean, and amaretto jam? Well, I meant to, but then I ate all the figs. Oops. 

Canned Tomatoes
Here are better instructions than I could ever give, with better pictures than I am currently capable of taking. This blog, Food In Jars, was suggested to me at the Concordia Sustainability Fair by "two canning wizardesses" who have not called me to can, as they said they would. I am only slightly disappointed. I managed on my own. Women are fickle, it seems. To be honest, if they called me tomorrow I'd still can with them. Does that make me sound desperate?

Anyway, the recipe is clear and simple. My only suggestion is that you really only need to blanch the tomatoes for one minute at most, as long as they're fully immersed in the water (ou may need to turn them over at the 30 second mark to ensure even blanching. Use tongs, not your fingers). 2 minutes of blanching and they start to cook, which really isn't a bad thing, but in general, the less-cooked the better. You're probably going to cook them in whatever recipe you use them for anyway, so save as much freshness now as you can. 

I used a mix of red and green tomatoes, mostly for aesthetics. The jars look cool (see the little bits of green in some of the jars?). The green tomatoes are a little more watery, though, so consider breaking them apart a little and draining them through a fine mesh sieve after blanching before stuffing them in the jars. The greens and are also a little more sour, so you may need to adjust for sweetness in whatever recipe you end up making. Make sure you process for 85 minutes after stuffing and safely sealing the cans. The lemon juice thing takes a little bit of calculation, but whip out that pencil and paper and remember how to cross multiply and you'll be fine. x = ?

It's genetic, I'm sorry.