Into the Woods

Canning is serious work. But it’s very satisfying to put up vegetables for the cold winter that you yourself grew during the hot summer. I canned tomatoes today. I have so many tomatoes that I probably will need to do it again.

I worked on the deck to the keep the heat out of the house, using a gas cooker fired with propane. But it was remarkably cool this morning — 64F when I started working about 7:30 a.m., and 75F when I finished about 11. A cool breeze was blowing out of the woods. A hummingbird hovered for a while to watch what I was doing. She must have been attracted by all the red.

For what it’s worth, my pressure canner is an All American model 915. It holds seven quart jars. Normally I am pretty good at estimating quantities. But I had no idea how many quarts my pile of tomatoes would make. I ended up with a lot of tomatoes left over. From those I will make sauce, and put it up in pint jars, if I can find some pint jars. This is not the best time of year to buy canning supplies, because some places are running out. If you have space to store things for the future, a good supply of canning jars and lids would be good stuff to stock.

Boiling water for blanching the skins off the tomatoes

Ready to pack the jars

I allowed almost three hours for the pressure cooker to cool.

Finally done