Today I Made...

SALSA!!! From my garden veggies. Oh my. We all love salsa, and homemade is the absolute best! This is what I did:

• Bought some supplies. If you haven't seen the new Ball Freezer Jars, you better run right to Wal-Mart (or just click here) and grab some. They are the bomb-diggity! So is the canning kit that I snagged for a mere $6.97! It had that awesome jar grabber thingy, a plastic funnel, a magnetic wand for grabbing those pesky jar flats and lids, and another little gizmo that checks for headspace and releases bubbles in the jar. Steal of a deal, I'd say!

• Laid out said supplies. They took up three counter tops, so this is just a peek at the organized mess!

• Prepared the jars and lids in boiling water. 

• Blanched 22 small to medium sized tomatoes so that they would be easy to peel. The skins pop in the boiling water, then they peel right away...no knife necessary! I love the bright color that they turn after blanching too... 

• While the tomatoes were blanching, Boo was chopping up the other goodies...2 small onions, 4 jalepeno peppers (also from my garden), and a lime. Well, the lime wasn't chopped, but it was hand-juiced. 

• After peeling and coring the blanched tomatoes, I added them to the onion, pepper, and lime juice in the blender. I spiced it up with half a package of salsa mix, 2 tsp cilantro, 4 Tbsp chopped garlic, and a quarter cup of sugar. It was too much for one blender, so we did it in two batches. 

• The salsa could be considered finished at this point, if you just wanted to put it in a container in the fridge or freezer...but I wanted to can it, so it needed to be boiled together for a minute or so. It looked nasty like tomato soup after boiling! 

• Finally, the fun part...ladling into jars and processing in a boiling water bath. I had no idea how much salsa I would have, so I prepared all of my jars. Only half were needed, but hey, that's 5 pints of homemade, homegrown salsa!!! Can't beat it and it is beautiful in the jars!!! 

• Last step...MAKE LABELS! I adore my label maker. It is very handy in the kitchen, and I am thinking I could use one at school.