Canning Tomato Soup...

A friend asked how I can tomato soup, so I am going to run you through the process I learned from my Mom (including a few pics) :)

Get quart jars cleaned and ready....or pints if you are a family of one! :)

Chop a nice size bunch of celery and 6 onions. Add them to a kettle with a little water. Cook them till tender.
I love the smell of cooking onions, but not so much the celery, so burn a candle to help with that if you like! :)

 Take the centers out of 8 quarts of tomato's and cut them into quarters. Add to the celery/onion mix.
(Side note: I did a  search to see how many tomato's makes 8 quarts and never really came to a good conclusion, so I just did what I thought! ;) Not always a great idea :P I think I cut up about 30 medium-small tomato's and I think I could have done a few more!??)

Cook it all till everything is tender.....

And then run the whole kettle through a strainer of some type. I don't have the nice Victorio strainer, but one that works just as well. :)

Having a teenage son that loves cranking the soup out is a great bonus! :)

After it's all been run through, dump the liquid back into the kettle and add more ingredients.

First, whisk 1 c. melted butter and 1 c. flour together, then add that mixture and 1 c. sugar and 1/4 c. salt to the soup. Blend well and simmer till slightly thickened.

Pour into jars, add lids and rings and wait for them to seal.

TIP: I make sure my jars are nice and hot before I pour the soup in. I also let the soup continue simmering while I was filling the jars to be sure it stayed nice and hot. 

I also experimented....I turned about half of the jars upside down to see if that would make a difference if they sealed....but ALL 6 jars sealed, so turning them upside down is not necessary! :)

It seems the soup got lighter this year....not sure why? Maybe I really did need to add more tomato's?? But I know one thing....it SMELLED like tomato soup! I see soup and toasted cheese sandwiches in Dan & my future this winter!

(The kid's don't care for tomato soup!) Crazy kids! :)

I still have quite a few tomato's left from the 30 gallons I got, so I think I will make another batch of salsa! :)