canning

My Mom puts up tomatoes every year from her garden, but the result is something so much more than 'canned tomatoes'.  It's heaven in a jar I tell you.  I crave it something awful.  Once in a while she'll send a jar in the mail and it's the highlight of the year.  She sent some to Jenny a couple of Christmases ago and all of the jars broke and it ruined everything else in the package too.  This was quite depressing for everyone involved.  I've wanted a chance to learn how to make the magic mixture, and yesterday I had my first lesson.  Canning is so cool!  Nobody does it anymore (at least people of my generation) and I fear it's becoming a lost art.  It turns out that Ty's Mom was also putting up tomatoes from her garden yesterday - I love how resourceful our Moms are!  It is very time consuming, and I understand that it's basically an impossibility for most people these days, but I have to say, the rewards are so great.  I can only imagine what it feels like for my Mom - because she's actually producing all the ingredients as well as doing the labor.  I was only a helper in the kitchen and I still felt good about the whole thing.

Anyway, we used a recipe that was handed down from my Grandma Brown, with a few tweaks and adjustments that my Mom has made over the years.  Rather than just tomatoes, it's essentially a 'base' that can be used for many things.  I like it right out of the jar for soup, but it's pretty darn versatile, and chock full of goodness and healthy stuff.  We were able to get 24 jars filled - the most my Mom has ever been able to produce with one batch.  Pretty exciting stuff.  The bonus was that it was just a fantastic day, spent with Mom in the kitchen.