Smoked Salsa

We have an abundance of tomatoes and peppers from our garden. It has been a banner year for tomatoes since we had so much rain early in the season! Therefore, we decided to make salsa with our harvest.

7 pounds of chopped tomatoes
1 pound of finely diced peppers
1 large red and yellow onion chopped
1 head of garlic chopped
1 bunch of cilantro (just the leaves)
1 bunch of thyme (just the leaves)
6 red hot peppers chopped
3 tablespoons of kosher salt
2 ounces of lime juice
6 shakes of Tabasco Smoked Chipotle sauce
1 capful of liquid smoke

First, we boiled the jars, rings and lids to sterilize. Chopped all the ingredients. In a pan with hot oil we added the onions let them cook for about one minute then add the garlic. We then added the peppers and tomatoes salt, hot peppers, lime juice, Tabasco and the liquid smoke. This cooked for about 8-9 minutes we then added the cilantro and thyme.

The mixture was removed from the stove and we began to fill the jars with the salsa. We wiped the edge of each jar with a clean paper towel then lifted the lid with a magnet and placed the lid on the top of the jar. You need to be careful not to touch the sterilized lids and jars so your salsa does not become contaminated, Once the lid is in place we twisted the rings in place to hold the lids. Back into the boiling water bath. The jars boiled for 15 minutes and were removed from the water and allowed to cool. As the jars are cooling, you will hear the lids popping and sealing themselves. If they do not pop, you can push them down and as long as they do not pop back up it is a good seal! Once completed cooled we removed the rings and labeled the salsa. Good eats!!!

TO SEE THE PHOTO ALBUM OF THE PROCESS CLICK ON THE PHOTO BELOW

Smoked Salsa

Garden Update May 31, 2009

We will be posting weekly garden updates on our blog, not only so we can track our progress but to make notes as to what has worked and what was not such a great idea.

Our latest experiment is growing tomatoes upside down in wire baskets we purchased from Wal-Mart for $7 each. We lined them with plastic to help keep the soil from drying out. The baskets were filled with Miracle Grow Garden Soil - not potting soil! I check the soil every day to ensure that the soil has not dries out. My concerns with this method are that the basket may be too small for all the roots. I had placed 3 petunia plans on the top and one tomato plant on the bottom, so there may be a war for root space.

I have been feeding the plants with "worm tea" from our vermicomposting bin. So far the plants look healthy they were planted on May 17, 2008.

We also had our first harvest of herbs, we did not pick any basil as it is not ready, rosemary it did not need a hair cut as this is the herb we use to most of and we did not take any parsley, still does not look like it could use that hair cut.

Click on the photo below to see the album

Garden May 30, 2009