The Big Tomato Payoff

Heirloom Tomatoes-Bird Back 40

Break it Down! Stop! Tomato Time!

Is your garden like mine? Heirloom tomatoes coming out of your ears? It is that time of year for us heirloom aficionados. Long after the hybrids have played out and stopped producing, the heirlooms move in and take over -- delivering harvest after harvest after harvest.

And if the weather holds? Yet another harvest!

What does one do when nature delivers a boatload of heirloom tomato goodness? A couple like yours truly and the wife that is Venus drags out the canning equipment and starts preparing for some very big canning projects. We can't eat 50 tomatoes in one or two sittings. But we'll make darn sure that each one of them finds it's way into a canning jar of whole tomatoes, tomato sauces or salsa.

First Steps: Wash and Core Tomatoes

There's nothing quite like a warm bite of salsa on a Monday Night Football game played in a snowstorm. That's the payoff, my friends, the big tomato payoff.

This most recent project pays homage to a home-canning professional by the name of Sharon Howard, who plied her trade during decades of gardening in the Alberta, Canada area. I first became aware of Sharon many moons ago when I grabbed one of her recipes for canning dill pickles. She was kind enough to share many tomato sauce and stewed tomato canning recipes that were decades old, resulting in some of the most ridiculously delicious sauces we have ever created.

But on this particular day last August -- the job facing us was fairly simple. My back had healed up to the point where I could actually bend and pick a bounty of a harvest without a nerve or a disc flying off the handle and into the next backyard. The job on this day would be placing as many whole tomatoes into one-quart canning jars and processing the haul through a pressure canning process.

Skinned Tomatoes

The most tedious part of this process would be removing the skins from the actual tomatoes. That's job I leave up to the wife that is Venus. My job is to boil said tomatoes first, in a pot of water. Then place those tomatoes I've stuck in boiling water for one minute into an ice water bath.

With perfect red, round and smooth tomatoes -- those skins will slip off quite easily. But heirloom tomatoes aren't red. They aren't round either. And they are anything but smooth. Heirloom tomatoes are rather unwieldy, cat-faced beasts. It makes the job of peeling off the skins a little tougher, but it's still well worth the effort when those cold winter months roll into town.

Pack Each Jar Full!

As you might be able to guess, this process takes a little time with 50-100 freshly harvested tomatoes. But as we've come to learn in previous years, anything less than 20 one-quart jars of whole tomatoes is going to leave us short when we need them. And I cannot tell you how much I detest the assignment of driving to the store (in cold weather no less) to pick up a can or two of whole or sliced tomatoes.

And do you think our sauces are going to taste as good with something that came out of a common cannery? Perish the thought! Yep -- we're spoiled alright. Mighty spoiled. But it's also spoiled in a good way.

Summer Goodness in a Jar

After the skins are off -- the task gets fairly simple. Once those one-quart jars are washed and sterilized through the boiling water bath process, it's time to add a tablespoon or two of processed lemon juice to each jar, cram them with as many peeled tomatoes as possible, wipe the rims of each jar, seal and process through a 30-minute pressure canning process.

Then end result on this day? 18 quarts of whole tomatoes. Add those 18 quarts to five others that we had put through the canning process earlier this summer, and the Bird household is stocked with whole tomatoes for winter use.

Under Pressure

Ah -- but that's just part of the canning process. Because you can't make a tomato-good pizza sauce without adding a little finished tomato SAUCE to those whole tomatoes. Know what that means? It means another harvest is three weeks off.

You think sauce is important? Well, don't ask me! Rob Schneider of Saturday Night Live fame made sauce famous with his signature lines from skit involving a restaurant called "Hub's Gyros: "You like a de sauce, eh? De sauce is good, eh? I get you more sauce!" Three simple lines. Non-stop laughter.

Simple instructions for canning whole tomatoes can be found here and here.

One Tomato, Two Tomato, Oh Lord!

Who Put These in my Sink?

And so it begins. It's that daily ritual when the summer garden that you've worked so hard to plant and nurture finally begins to pay off with....More work.

WTF? Who signed me up for this?

It's that time in the summer when every green tomato plant is showing several different shades of summer color. When you start to notice big rigs on the highway loaded down with paste tomatoes headed to the nearest cannery, you know that treasured season has arrived at last. Heirloom tomato season is here.

Oh, Dear Lord...

It announced itself with a proverbial bang this past weekend. Both the wife that is Venus and I knew that we would probably be required to do a bit of early-season canning based upon the ripe tomatoes we could spot growing near the base of each plant.

But when we discovered that those one or two ripened tomatoes held a treasure trove of five to six or ten more? We knew we were in for a job. When just the chore of harvesting leaves you grasping for the nearest bottle of cold water and perhaps a little relief from a fan lined up in front of the air conditioner, you've got a job on your hands.

And what a job it was.

The Lush Queen Tomato

Venus and I had been expecting to can about seven to ten quarts of whole tomatoes when we first surveyed the garden that Saturday morning. We badly underestimated. Twenty quarts wasn't going to hold what we took from the garden that morning -- and the tomatoes just continue to ripen at a rather maddening pace.

So this is what overload means.

Venus and I normally can a variety of heirloom tomato dish options during our home-canning adventures. There's the famous and always-in-demand Roasted Garlic, Pepper and Heirloom Tomato Salsa and the equally scrumptious Herbed Tomato Sauce.

Venus Peels Skins Off Whole Tomatoes

But we had a problem. The tomatoes came a little earlier than normal this year. I'm not sure if it's that spell of 100-degree heat that caused the early ripening, or the pains we took at plant out last April. Whatever it was, it spelled a boatload of tomatoes and the kind of harvest one would expect in mid-August -- not July.

Since the peppers weren't quite ready for large scale harvest just yet -- and salsa depends wide varieties and numbers of peppers -- salsa was out. As for the Herbed Tomato Sauce? We still have a jar or two of that stuff leftover from last year's harvest. Why make more?

Skins Off! Time for Canning!

But whole tomatoes? We use that stuff all the time and ran through the last quart from last year's harvest back in March. And so? The project for this day? Can whole tomatoes for winter. Because there's nothing quite like popping open a can of home-canned, vine-ripened tomatoes from your own garden during the dead of winter. It springs the smell of a summer garden into your kitchen -- which is nice -- because the calendar says December and it's damn cold outside.

Canning whole tomatoes also happens to be one of the easier home canning projects. Simply wash the fruit, remove the cores, peel the skins, stick them in jars, add a tablespoon of bottled lemon juice or two plus a dab of salt and you're day is done after you process the completed haul in a pressure or water-bath canner. Some growers even prefer to leave the skins on. More power to them. That's one less step for us to take.

Whole Tomatoes? Or Monster Brains???

Jars of home-canned tomatoes look positively funky because the water inside the fruit tends to separate during the canning process. No matter how many tomatoes one jam packs into that one-quart jar -- it's going to come out half tomatoes and half water -- tomatoes at the top and tomato liquid at the bottom.

Yes -- you're right -- it does look a little like something out of Frankenstein's monster. But it's one dish that Baron Victor von Frankenstein would approve of.

Even mad scientists gotta eat sometime. Think about it!

Soup's On!

Fresh Garden Veg-All!

As our summer days begin that ever so slow slide into that cooler interim we call "fall," it's time to take stock of what's left in the summer garden, and what's done. Although some heirloom tomato patches are still churning out fruit, our heirloom plantings pretty much petered out a solid month ago. While we still enjoy the occasional tomato or two, the bushel harvests are a distant memory.

I'm sad to see those days end. I'm never ready for the end of summer gardening season. Although there are things to plant in fall and spring, nothing offers the diversity of produce that springs from a summer garden. What is a gardener to do then, when the sudden urge for an ear of heirloom corn or a single pole bean comes on strong in the dead of winter.

Carrots from the Bird Back 40

My friends, we are prepared!

One of our favorite evening meals, especially during those weeknights after a long day at work, is a simple soup that contains ground turkey, a bit of broth, can of tomatoes and a can of Veg-All. The wife that is Venus stumbled upon this recipe some years ago, and it's been a staple in the Bird Houze ever since. Add in some freshly baked crescent rolls and you've got yourself one quick and easy supper.

This meal is that much better when you can add a can of tomatoes or tomato sauce that came straight from the Bird Back 40 the previous summer. As I took stock of what was left in the summer garden some weeks ago, it suddenly struck me, why purchase the canned vegetable stock known as "Veg-All?" Why not make your own Veg-All at home?

Leaning Towers of Pole Beans

We already know that anything fresh from the backyard is far superior than anything that can be purchased in the local supermarket. So why stop at canning projects that involve tomatoes and cucumbers? Why not put that overproductive carrot patch that would make Bugs Bunny jealous to good use? Our pole bean planting efforts now strongly resemble the Leaning Tower of Pisa. And although this year's corn crop was nothing to write home about, there was still enough there to add to the mix.

Three garden vegetables = Homemade Veg-All.

Fresh Heirloom Garden Corn

One important thing to consider before we move even further into this project is this: This project involves the use of pressure canning equipment. Water bath canners simply do not provide the pressure needed to safely can non-acidic vegetables like this, unless additional acid in the form of vinegar or lemon juice is added. At that point, you wind up with pickled vegetables rather than the canned variety. Even with our pressure canning equipment, Venus and I added a tablespoon of lemon juice to each pint jar before canning, just to play it safe.

Chopped and Ready for Processing

I must say, this has been an excellent year for carrots of all shapes and sizes in the Bird Back 40. The same holds true with the pole bean crop that we planted in July after removing a less than stellar garlic crop. The planter beds that dot the Bird Back 40 don't stay empty for very long. Once one crop is removed, the tired soil is amended and new seeds are added for the next crop.

But, I digress.

Parboil and Can

This is a much simpler project than canning tomato sauce, whole tomatoes and salsa. Those canning efforts involve a number of different steps before the actual product is added to jars and placed inside canning equipment for processing. For a simple vegetable mix like this? It's pick, clean, chop, mix together, parboil and can. The only difference is processing time -- about 45 minutes at 15 lbs. pressure. Just the simple act of processing can take several hours, especially if you have more jars of product than canning space in the pressure canning equipment.

But the payoff is a sweet treat during those cold winter months. If popping open a jar of home-canned tomatoes or tomato-sauce brings that sweet smell of summer into the kitchen, I can only begin to imagine the smells and taste that our vegetable canning efforts will bring.

SIMPLE WINTER SOUP

1 lb. ground turkey

1 tablespoon oil

1 onion

4-5 cloves peeled garlic

1 14.5 ounce can beef broth (water and beef bullion works just as well)

1 14 ounce can whole or chopped tomatoes

1 can Veg-All

Fresh or dry herbs

Fresh Garden Veg-All

Use food processor to ground garlic into bits and cut onion into appropriate bite-sized pieces. If you don't have a food processor, use a blender, or put a butcher knife to good use and start chopping. Add onion, garlic and ground turkey to soup pot containing oil, and proceed to cook on medium high heat until meat is cooked and no longer pink.

Add beef broth, tomatoes, Veg-All and herbs of your choice (Venus uses a mix of basil, oregano, cilantro, marjoram, whatever she has handy) and bring to a boil. Simmer for 20 minutes. Remove from heat, or just turn the stove off and allow soup to cool slightly before serving. Pop some crescent rolls or any other role into the oven for ten minutes and serve with soup.

Enjoy!

Where Have I BEEN???

Whole Heirloom Tomatoes & Garlic Dill Pickles

That is one good question. Cause when three solid weeks pass without Bill Bird so much as touching the blog that is Sacramento Vegetable Gardening -- one goes through a withdrawl of sorts. Not that I haven't thought about it -- boy have I! But -- you see -- time is the problem.

As you can tell from the photo to the immediate right -- we've certainly found our time to put the summer backyard produce to good use. There are quarts and quarts of whole heirloom tomatoes for winter time use. Venus and I just finished up on our latest project this past weekend -- 19 pints of lip-smacking tomato sauce infused with fresh herbs like sage, thyme, basil, oregano, basil -- plus a Jalapeno pepper or two.

Heirloom Tomato Sauce Infused with Fresh Herbs

Oh -- and that doesn't include the 20-odd pints of fresh Roasted Garlic, Pepper and Heirloom Tomato Salsa. That's a Bird Family tradition!

But with two demanding jobs to hold down, five of the brattiest cats known to mankind -- plus a spoiled rotten dog (Ultimate Digging Machine) -- and four different homes to care for -- well -- that thing called "free time" is at a premium.

Speaking of which -- anyone interested in renting a fine home? Gardening boxes and not one -- but TWO loaded orange trees to boot -- included? Leave a note for me at the bottom of the blog. The fresh citrus comes with the house. Think of it as a "bonus."

Despite the demands upon our free time -- it hasn't stopped us from enjoying all of the Bird Back 40 bounty that summer has to offer. It hasn't stopped a couple of marauding mockingbirds either -- and now I fully understand why they call them "mockingbirds." The name is well deserved.

Fresh Fruit Harvest!

Let's be honest here, shall we? This has been one fine summer. I wish I'd been able to write it about it more often. From heirloom tomatoes on the vine, bell peppers by the boatload, two different types of eggplant, three varieties of squash, a nice selection of corn-on-the-cob and some surprising fresh fruit deliveries -- life has been good indeed.

One of the best harvests came just a few weeks ago -- and based upon what came ripe from our young fruit trees this year -- we'll be expecting a lot more of this in years to come. We've been building up the fruit tree and bush offerings in the Bird Back 40 in the hopes that it would produce a real backyard "fruit salad." And as you can tell -- we came close.

Table Grape Vines: Bird Back 40

This is the second year of production for the eight table grape vines that frame in the six main 4X8 foot raised beds in the backyard garden. Those aren't the only beds we have in the Bird Back 40 -- but it's clearly the main growing area. It's where you will find a multitude of heirloom tomato offerings -- Asian Baby Corn -- four or five different varieties of basil and we usually devote at least one bed to all things Bush Beans.

I knew from the outset that I was going to get some production off the eight table grape vines that the wife that is Venus and I planted during the 2010 bare root season. Little did I know -- however -- that the mockingbirds would savor the vast majority of the crop. Despite the addition of Scare Tape, a Scare Crow and netting -- nothing would stop two very determined birds from stealing the vast majority of the Bird table grape crop.

Mental note: I need to spend this winter building a better mousetrap!

Arctic Jay White Nectarines & O'Henry Peaches!

But I'll tell you something about mockingbirds. They are not the most perfect of thieves. In other words, they left a smattering of Fiesta, Muscat and Diamond grapes behind. Add a smattering of table grapes to the last of the white nectarines, some tree-ripened O'Henry Peaches and a selection of strawberries and you've got yourself something special.

It's a fruit salad from your own backyard!

And there's nothing quite like the zest and zing from tree or vine-ripened fruit that some straight from your own backyard. Sure -- you can purchase the same thing in your local supermarket or perhaps a Sacramento Certified Farmer's Market. But it's just not going to compare from the selection of truly ripe, sweet, soft and fruit selections from the backyard.

Fresh Fruit Salad Anyone?

About the only thing missing this year from the Bird Back 40? A fresh selection of watermelon and cantaloupe. It's the one crop -- the one and only crop I might add -- that failed to produce this year. Make a mental note of this children: Do not plant watermelon and cantaloupe seeds in the same area as pumpkin seeds. The end result is -- you get lots of pumpkins and little else.

But we'll write about pumpkins next month. Lord knows -- we have enough to supply the general neighborhood this year. I see a slice or two of pumpkin pie, pumpkin bread and all things pumpkin in my nearby and immediate future. Give the wife that is Venus a pumpkin and she'll turn it into something that will make your taste buds quiver with excitement.

Home-Grown Table Grapes

But for now? The grapes are still producing. The mockingbirds are long gone (thank goodness) and a nice crop of Red Flame grapes are just about ready. Like just about every fruit offering in the Bird Back 40 -- the harvest is a tad late this year.

But there is a nice harvest to come just the same.

Harvest Season IS NOT a Celebration!

Heirloom Tomato Harvest: Bird Back 40

Let me get this straight: Harvest Season is WORK! Celebrate all you want -- but when you come home after a week in Santa Cruz and Seattle to find 50-60 lbs. of ripe heirloom tomatoes hanging off the vine -- you don't crack open a 12-pack and crank up the IPOD.

Nope -- you get to WORK son. Because the clock is TICKING! Mother Nature isn't about to wait around until you're good and ready to save that bountiful summer produce. Nope! What's on the kitchen counter right now turns to slop in 24-48 hours -- so you BEST GET WORKING.

With all due respect to my fine gardening friends at the Fair Oaks Horticulture Center who hosted the annual Harvest Celebration this past weekend (a fun event that I was sorry to miss) -- celebration my left foot!

Blessed with Heirloom Production

The wonderful wife that is Venus and I took our first tender steps at canning summer produce two seasons ago when we were confronted with a boatload of production from our heirloom tomato plantings. Little did we know that we would progress from those baby steps to perfecting a number of canning-safe recipes that have resulted in numerous quarts of whole heirloom tomatoes, tomato sauce infused with fresh basil and peppers, dill pickles infused with dill (surprise!), creamed garlic, thai basil and other spices and the always famous -- always in demand -- Roasted Garlic, Pepper and Heirloom Tomato Salsa.

The first step in any canning process is to first gather up the produce. We knew -- before we left for eight days of wedding duties and other family gatherings -- that the garden was giving that tell-tale sign of over-production. So, we weren't all that surprised to discover a multitude of vine-ripened heirloom tomatoes and aircraft carrier sized squash upon our return.

I know that a number of growers in the Sacramento area are not having the best of years when it comes to tomato production. I don't know why we have been so blessed. It might be micro-climates. It might be the fertilizer cocktails that I've been feeding the garden with through the summer. It just might be dumb luck (probably). Yes, we've been cursed with quite a bit of Blossom End Rot (BER). But it hasn't slowed us down much.

Whole Tomatoes, Skins Removed, Ready for Canning

The multitude of pepper plants that we have planted nearby in the Bird Back 40 are just as loaded as the tomato offerings -- but unlike the tomatoes -- the peppers are still another week or two away from that "ready to harvest" stage that's required for our salsa concoction. So, the tomatoes pictured above were dropped in vats of boiling water to remove skins and saved for whole tomato canning purposes.

The end result? About 18-quarts of whole tomatoes. That's not bad -- but still not quite enough to last through an entire winter (plus -- they make great gifts at Christmas).

The ripe heirloom tomatoes weren't the only item begging to be picked this past Sunday. The cucumber plantings -- while late -- had finally taken off. The wife that is Venus LOVES cucumbers. She can't get enough of them -- in salads or in other dishes. So she manages to plant several pickling and slicing varieties -- which include my favorite: the Armenian Giant.

Pickling and Armenian Giant Cucumbers

Not only does the Armenian Giant go well in salads and other creations -- it also happens to be one of the tougher cucumber customers. And that toughness makes it a perfect candidate for pickling. Not all pickling cucumbers can stand up to the home-canning process. They tend to get soft. Trust me when I tell you that there's nothing worse that a soft pickle. Pickles are destined to be crunchy. And crunchy pickles are what we specialize in at the Bird Home for All Things Canning.

So -- this past Sunday -- while the cucumbers were soaking in a giant vat of ice water -- Venus and I were preparing multitudes of heirloom tomatoes for the whole tomato canning process. We also put a new weapon to work in the kitchen: a pressure canner.

Cucumbers Soaking in an Ice Water Bath

There are plenty of ladies in this world who would prefer shoes, clothing or fine jewelry for Christmas. The wife that is Venus instead requests things like ironing boards, vaccum cleaners and pressure canners. I grew up in a Modesto family where I would have been lined up against a wall and shot repeatedly for the crime of buying my mother or any sister an ironing board for Christmas. It was a lesson that I learned well.

Venus has had to do quite a bit of de-programming. While she enjoys and receives some of the finer things in life -- she also requests items where Bill Bird dare not tread as a child. It wasn't all that long ago -- if you recall -- when Feminism was the rage. If there was a newspaper story about a husband run down by an angry wife for the crime of purchasing her an ironing board for Christmas, the usual response from my mother and sisters was something along the line of: "well, he probably deserved it."

So, when Venus requested a pressure canner for Christmas last year? I was just a tad nervous.

Whole Tomatoes in a Pressure Canner

But, not to worry. If there's one thing I've learned about Venus -- it's that she is the Master of the Garden. Everything she touches, grows. It's not a chore for her. It's not a chore for me either. She loves putting the "V for Venus" gardening boxes through a workout. I love it too. That "love" for everything gardening has transcended into saving the produce that she creates. She watched her grandmother perform this chore. She watched her mother do the same. Although she holds a degree from Berkeley, it doesn't stop her from getting down and dirty.

The pressure canner is indeed a vast improvement over the water-bath canner that we have used for the past two seasons. Not only is it a time-saver in terms of getting the job done quickly -- but it also results in far less mess in the kitchen. Short and sweet? I should have invested in a pressure canner years ago.

Sealing Pickle Quart Jars

Canning in the Bird Household is always a team effort. Although one person can easily perform this task -- it's a lot more fun when four hands are involved. The process of canning summer produce isn't that hard -- it's the prep work leading up to the process that takes the vast amount of time.

You can't just pick and toss tomatoes into canning jars and be done with it. The same rule applies to cucumbers and other goodies from the backyard garden. With a pressure canner at the ready, a gardener can put just about anything into a prepared mason jar and save it for winter use.

There is truly nothing better than sharing a jar or five of Roasted Garlic, Pepper and Heirloom Tomato Salsa with family and friends. There's nothing quite like cracking open a jar of heirloom tomatoes in the dead of winter and breathing in that deep and satisfying scent of summertime produce. A can of tomatoes purchased at a store simply cannot compare to the taste of home-canned heirloom tomatoes. Once you've had that taste there is no going back.

Quarts of Whole Tomatoes and Dill Pickles

But I'm not going to fool you kids -- not for a second. Remember this important fact: Harvest Season isn't for celebrating. Harvest Season is work.

And our work is just beginning. That sweet summer payoff is now underway.