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The kitchen is finally cleaned up after the tornado-session of canning this weekend. I did 16 pints of canned sauce and two quarts of chopped tomatoes. Also, I froze 6 pints of raw chopped tomatoes. The mess! The work! The pans! The heat! The sticky floor! The exhausted gardener! It seems crazy, but I enjoy this...

It feels SO GOOD to know I have these tomatoes put by! We get a very easy-to-prepare meal from a can of tomato sauce, a starch and a veggie or two, plus some seasonings. These are going to help us a lot in the coming year. Now, as I recover from this effort I have to face the fact that there's more canning ahead! I would love to have about 4 dozen pints of tomato sauce so that's going to be 2 or 3 more mad sessions like this one. I must be crazy.

Good Crazy!
Good for you, Anna!

I can totally understand. It is so much work. I use to also can green beans, squash and beets, plus sauerkraut. I'd do massive amounts it seemed. Whew, but I was younger.

It always made me smile when I'd be on the shelf picking out dinner, and know came from my organic garden.

I also dehydrate tomatoes. Another technique I tried this year is to slow roast them (at 200 degrees for 12 hours) and then freeze the roasted tomatoes. The flavor is so rich and complex!

oooooh!!!!!!! Thanks for the suggestion! I'll bet I could do that in my solar cooker. Wow, I'll bet that's YUMMY!

when I think of roast I think high heat. interesting. Anna keep us or me, posted if the slow cooker works. I don't have an oven. Well, I have a toaster oven, but I'd never leave it on for 12 hrs.