Processing tomatoes

I'll need to do more posting about canning of tomatoes, but this can be a bit of a kickoff.

I wrote previously about how we harvested enough tomatoes last week to fill a seven gallon bucket.  A day or two later, Wifey and I did the first phase for her canning.

1. Clean the tomatoes under the faucet.  Gently scrub off the garden debris (mud splash, dried leaves, etc) from the tomatoes.
2. Half-fill a medium-sized pot and put on the stove under low heat.  For our electric stove, we set the temp at 3.  It's more than a simmer, but still below medium heat.
3. Put a small slice in each of a half-dozen tomatoes and gently drop into the water.  Leave them there until you see the skin start to pucker.
4. In a large bowl or large/low pot, 2/3 fill it with ice water.
5. With a large slotted spoon, remove the tomatoes and drop into the ice water bath.  This will shock the tomato and loosen its skin.
6. With a sharp knife (or your finger nails), remove the skin from the tomato.  Cut it into large chunks such that each is around the size of a large cherry tomato.  
• Be sure to smell the tomato.  If it smells at all like rot, throw it out.  It should smell strongly like tomato.
• If the skin doesn't readily come off from the tomato, if you had it in the hot water long enough, the tomato isn't ripe enough.  Throw it out.
7. Collect all of the processed tomatoes in a large container and refrigerate until you're ready to finish canning it.

Last night, Wifey finished the canning work.  The seven gallons of tomatoes made up six quarts of tomatoes.

The total is now 42 quarts for the year.