[Linnette] Hi, Im Linnette Goard field specialist in food safety with Ohio State University Extension and we're here in Gahanna, Ohio with Melanie Forsythe and she has a lovely home here that she's invited us in today and I understand you have a little urban farm here you want to talk a little bit about what you doing here [Melanie] thank you for coming out to my house, its really lovely. Five years ago my husband and I bought this place and we have two acres and we really wanted to live a little bit more sustainably and replace some other things that we normally bought at the store with things that we could grow here in our home. So we started with chickens to replace the eggs and thats gone fantastic. We got some goats to use for milk. That has been alright and we have also been doing bee hives and so were able to get our first harvest of honey this year which is really exciting. But we would like to start canning our tomatoes So that I don't have to buy them from the store anymore and so that is why you are here with me. [Linnette] Great I understand that you put an Instagram picture on facebook yes and that's how we found you absolutely and you wanted to learn a little more about what to do with these tomatoes that you pick this morning. Okay Melanie we're gonna start with your tomatoes that you've harvested this morning and we want to clean your tomatoes first and I understand you've already done that and the best way to clean vegetables is to wash them in clear running water. We don't need any special vegetable washes or anything like that. Clear water is fine so we're going to be processing crushed tomatoes in a hot water bath canner and so we have boiling water and we have a bowl with ice water in it and what we're gonna do is take your tomatoes dip them into the hot bioling water for 30 seconds. Leave them in their and then put him into the water bath and what that will do is that'll help us so we can slip the skins off of there. [Melanie] Do they just come right off? [Linnette] They do! and we'll see that. Okay so let's get started, let me set this over here. So we're going to take just a few of the tomatoes put them in our strainer. [Melanie] Is that enough? [Linnete] that's enough to get started with and I'll just put it down in the water and we need to leave in there for 30 seconds. [Linnette] Okay after after 30 seconds were gonna take these out of here and we're gonna put them into the ice water. [Melanie] Wonderful and then this is the part that you get your hands dirty and maybe it's a little warm but you're going to take them out of here and the skins slip right off. [music] [Linnette] Ok we're down to the last two let's get these finished into the pot and the next thing we're going to do is take these crushed tomatoes and put 'em on to boil and just cook them down a little bit so that we can get them in the jars on. [music] [Linnette] Okay we're ready to a get these tomatoes into the jars we crushed our tomatoes they've been boiling it only takes about five minutes for that process and just kinda crush them down as they're cooking they create their own juice we did not add any water to the mixture at all [Melanie] So amazing! [Linnette] In the meantime we washed our jars in hot soapy water rinsed them well. The other thing you can do is just run them through the dishwasher cycle that's fine, just make sure they're clean. Today we're going to use the citric acid and for pints you would use a 1/4 teaspoon per pint, for quarts, use a 1/2 teaspoon per quart and so we're using quarts today and so we're gonna go ahead and do that and we'll just put that in the bottom of the jar we're going to ladle Our crushed tomatoes into the jars, just that easy the other thing then, which is a consideration is how much headspace we leave. For this particular one it says a half inch so that's our half-inch mark and what we want to do is we want to fill it up to the bottom see it's just touching there. Ok, this jar is ready to put the lid on and what this is are lids, our inner lids that we use on top of the jar we put them in hot water we want simmering water we just want to soften that rubber seal and we're going to home make sure that the top of that is clean and then we're going to put the inner lid on this inner lid is a one-time use. So, once you store, then use that product, your going to throw the lid away. we throw this away. [Melanie] Okay so I can save the jar, but not the inner lid. [Linnette] And you can save the ring. And the ring goes over that. [Melanie] Thats something I never knew either. [Linnette] When you put the ring on, you put it on just till it catches and then you're gonna turn it just fingertip tight okay you don't want to crank them on. A lot of people crank that ring on there and what it does, it puts a bind between the top of this lid and the ring and those jars don't seal. [Melanie] You see that's amazing because I would think you have to make a really tight. [Linnette] so you're going to do the next one. (music) And we're gonna move our canner over onto the burner and it does get pretty heavy go ahead and put it on high cause we wanna get that water boiling. Now's the time to go ahead and fill the canner and you want the water to be an inch above the top of the lids okay Melanie, the times up we've processed these for 45 minutes so go ahead and turn the heat off. okay will take the lid off. [Melanie] Wow, it's boiling in there [Linnette] Yeah. Ok, as soon as that calms a little bit cuz you don't want to burn yourself The rolling boil can attack you I guess (laugh) so go ahead and take them out. As you're taking the jars out make sure you pick them straight up and just place them on your towel and you want to have a nice flat surface that you can put them on. Can goods should be used within a year. [Melanie] Okay. [Linnette] So, just put up enough that you would use for one year and next year you'll process more [Melanie] Wonderful I'm so excited. [Linnette] Well thank you for allowing me to come into your home and and show you how to do this we really appreciate i. [Melanie] Linnette, you have been so, its just been a joy to have you here thank you so much for taking the time to come to my house I feel ready to try it on my own! [Linnette] And there's other products that you may want to try and so don't forget to go find our fact sheets and work through those it's just a good place to start. You can go to to our website which is go.osu.edu/foodpreservation. We also have other videos that are available for you on a variety of food-related topics you can go to youtube.com/osuextension thanks for watching us today!