I'm sure some will disagree with me on this but I have always just put all my tomatoes in the freezer whole and not procesed at all. I just bought a bag of lemons that I'll do the same with just wash and freeze. Good thing about freezing is the skin falls right off them when thawed. I stopped blanching years ago. Seems to make some veggys rubbery.
Yes if I have enough but sometimes I don't so I put freeze till I do have enough to drag out all the canning supplies. If we didn't have a good crop sometimes we'd just buy a box of tomatoes from local farmers market.
So what's your opinion of freezing them until I want to make sauce, and skipping the canning altogether?
We really had a great expirence when we did hydroponics in our greenhouse, but that was about 6 years .Below is some of our tomato we grew plus had some in containers.
It is perfectly fine to freeze tomatoes until you accumulate enough to make it worthwhile to can a batch. Pressure canning of tomatoes is not necessary if you follow a recipe and ensure that the pH is low enough to prevent bacterial growth. @Marie Mallery you said you gave up blanching long ago. While that is fine with tomatoes and other nightshades, most veggies need to be blanched prior to freezing (or dehydrating) to prevent the slow breakdown of the veggies in the freezer (or on the shelf in the case of drying). Wife has begun making tomato paste by baking (roasting) pans of tomatoes in the oven prior to canning, It works very well and eliminates hours of on-the-stovetop cooking away the moisture. You can also do this for sauce and the cooking time is less than with the paste.
That's pretty cool. What did you use for food? Is there special hydroponics food, or did you just buy fertilizer from Walmart and dissolve it in the water? I've thought of setting up a greenhouse, but there's no sense in this climate...it might tack a few weeks onto the beginning and end of the growing season, but that's about it. The farm across the street has maybe 6 greenhouses, and they each have a small wood stove for year-round use.
Good point on the drying especially. And yes the consistancy of the fruit is different but it works ok for us. We use it in all our tomato type recipe's. And like you said drting is not possible after freezing. Good points Don.
Can you elaborate on this, Don? Do you mean just put them in jars without processing? Are tomatoes generally acidic enough on their own, or are we talking adding lemon juice or another acid? Regarding making tomato paste... @Beth Gallagher posted a video similar to this one of women in Sicily sun-drying their tomato paste. It's fascinating what different climates enable.
For fertilizer we tried to stay organic but didn't like the fish odor or the products we tried. So we went to the regular fertlzer and it worked great. https://www.morgancountyseeds.com/ Your right about the climate control inside greenhouse. It cost to use it during winter months here ,we can get in the 20s for short spells several years ago even single digets. I 've wished many times when I built this house I'd put in solarim or at least sun room. We buy our supplies from a couple different places. Food grade reservour material is from Hrrenhouse Supllies, nwt pots,air stones, tubing, etc comes from Aquaponic Supplies.
That is neat but down here it would be a 'Guess Whos Coming To Dinner' moment, the wildlife would have a feast.
@John Brunner I just meant you could just use water bath techniques. There is no need to use pressure, since you mentioned your canner doesn't build pressure if the gasket is bad. Pressure canning tomatoes generally diminishes quality as the tomatoes are heated to higher temps than necessary. Acid is usually added to each jar to ensure the pH is low enough to prevent bacterial spore germination and bacterial growth. Commercial lemon juice is what is generally used, as fresh lemon juice is not regulated for pH. Vinegar or citric acid can also be used. Just follow recipe to get it right. In theory, if you use ONLY heirloom tomatoes, the pH will be low enough, but no reason to take chances when the safety measure is so easy and cheap.
Thanks! I forgot about the water bath method of canning. Regarding your comment about commercial lemon juice...I've got recipes that call for bottled lemon juice for the specific reason you cite.