Ketchup, For The Good Times {Recipe}

Some preserves are easy, some are drastically cheaper than store-bought, and some are tastier than anything you can buy. Alas, homemade ketchup is none of these things.

So I can't exactly explain why I make it every year.

I suppose I can ketchup because processing all the jars of regular sauce becomes boring. And when I'm in the midst of tomato madness, condensing a little puree with spices isn't any extra trouble - it is, in fact, a welcome chance to do something different.

Last year I improved my ketchup method by cooking the sauce down in a slow cooker. This prevents the bottom from scorching and makes it easy to leave the house or do other chores during the lengthy, oh so lengthy, cooking period.

While ketchup doesn't meet any of my traditional characteristics of a recommended preserve, HITK readers have ask for my recipe. Here it is:

Homemade Ketchup

Makes: approximately 5 pints Time: 12 hours cooking, 30 minutes active

1 teaspoon olive oil 1 whole onion, diced 2 quarts tomato pulp (most easily made with a food strainer and sauce maker tool, or made by stewing tomatoes and running through a manual foodmill to remove skins and seeds.) 1 cup brown sugar or honey 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar 1 teaspoon garlic powder sachet of whole aromatic spices (your choice of bay leaf, cinnamon stick, cloves, allspice berries, juniper berries, celery seeds - I use a little of each) 1 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon white pepper 1/2 teaspoon lemon juice per pint

1. Heat a medium sized pot over low heat. Add olive oil and onions. Cook until translucent, approximately 10 minutes. 2. Add onions and remaining ingredients except for lemon juice to a slow cooker*. Turn slow cooker on high and allow to simmer for 3-4 hours. 3. Remove spice sachet and set aside. Puree mixture with an immersion blender. 4. Replace spice sachet and continue to cook for 3-4 hours. Taste (don't burn your tongue!) and adjust salt, pepper, vinegar, or sugar as you see fit. 5. Continue cooking and tasting until tomato is of ketchup consistency. This may take an additional 3-4 hours. 6. Ladle hot ketchup into sterile jars with one half teaspoon lemon juice per pint. Wipe rims, place on two part lids, and process in a water bath for 35 minutes/pints, 40 minutes/quarts. Remove from water bath, cool, and store properly.

*Don't have a slow cooker? Use a medium pot on low heat, uncovered, and stir frequently to be sure the bottom does not burn.

This post, with much respect for the A Prairie Home Companion, brought to you by the Ketchup Advisory Board.

Ideas for the Tomato Tonnage

After you have made tomato sandwiches, salads, stews, and more, it is tempting to just toss the rest of you CSA or home garden tomato harvest in the compost heap.  Preserving tomatos is not that hard and you will thank yourself in the fall for putting up farm fresh goodness.  Here are a few ideas for easy preserving: Make pseudo sun-dried tomatos: Halve and dry in a dehydrator or low temp (as low as you can get it, ideally 145 deg F.) oven for 12 - 24 hours.  They will be ready to store at room temperature when you can break one in half and see no beads of moisture.

Make easy sauce: Most tomato sauce recipes call for blanching the tomatoes, which is the most time consuming (and burn inducing) part of the work.  It is easier to just skip the blanching and puree the whole tomato.  Freeze your sauce for less work than canning.

Make ketchup: Ketchup (catsup?) requires a tremendous amount of tomatos.  Just yesterday I made a batch with about 15 pounds of tomatos and ended up with a meager three half pints of ketchup.  Homemade ketchup is fabulously delicious, making it worth the effort.  These are basic directions, which I modified by substituting molasses and honey for sugar and juniper berries for aromatics.  If you aren't obsessed with canning like me, just freeze in small containers.

Freeze: As a last resort, throw your maters in the freezer.  Whole is fine.  Put them in a container to reduce freezer burn.  When you thaw frozen whole tomatoes, the texture will be completely broken, but they are still useful to add to stews and sauces.

Even if you do compost rotten tomatos, all is not lost.  Our compost heap volunteers have turned out to be fabulous producers!