How to Make and Can Spaghetti Sauce From Scratch
Sarah is a homemaker and stay-at-home mom who enjoys writing about motherhood, healthy living, finances, gardening, and all things homely.
How to Make and Can Spaghetti Sauce From Scratch
As a homemaker, feeding my family healthy, organic, and minimally processed foods must sometimes take a back seat to our needs for frugality. So when I discovered that I could have my sauce and eat it too by making and canning my own spaghetti sauce, I was hooked. However, it took a few tries to get my recipe just right. I started looking at existing sauce recipes, and while they had their merits, they were missing the bold, robust flavors I was looking for. Over time, I developed my own recipe—the one I'm sharing with you today.
Imagine giving an Italian dinner basket with a loaf of homemade French bread, fresh noodles, a pint of sauce, and a bottle of wine as a gift for an anniversary or birthday gift for a friend, or the look on your family's face when they take that first bite of real sauce. I haven't bought commercial spaghetti sauce in over 3 years, and you won't either once you try your hand at making your own.
Cook Time
| Prep time | Cook time | Ready in | Yields |
|---|---|---|---|
3 hours | 1 hour 30 min | 4 hours 30 min | 10–11 quarts of sauce and juice |
Ingredients
- 20 pounds tomatoes, use a combination of meat and juicing tomatoes
- 6 medium onions, diced
- 1 head garlic, pressed
- 5 tbsp olive oil
- 5 tbsp salt
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1 bunch each oregano, parsley, and basil, chopped
- 1 cup lemon juice
- 4 cups shredded zucchini, (optional)
- 4 cups diced red bell pepper, (optional)
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Instructions
- Blanch tomatoes in small batches for 2 minutes, or until skin spits easily when pierced with a knife, and immerse in ice water. Core and peel tomatoes and set in extra-large stock pot set over medium heat. Stir tomatoes often. Meanwhile, continue blanching, coring and peeling the rest of the tomatoes. Tip: Squeeze first several tomatoes to release their juices so that tomatoes will not burn. You may halve or quarter tomatoes to speed up cooking time, but this is unnecessary.
- Once all tomatoes are in the stock pot, add onion, (optional bell pepper or zucchini), garlic, salt and sugar. Continue cooking over medium-high heat, stirring frequently and crushing tomatoes with the wooden spoon, for 15–20 minutes. Tip: For a smoother texture, puree mixture using a handheld blender after 15–20 minutes. Otherwise, just crush well.
- Add lemon juice, oregano, parsley, and basil and cook 15 minutes longer. Strain out and reserve juice until sauce reaches desired consistency. Tip: Reserved juice make delicious tomato soup. Pour juice into pint jars or freeze to preserve.
- Pour sauce into quart ball jars and process for 30 minutes in a water bath canner. Label jars and store for up to 1 year.
Puree sauce for smoother texture.
Put jars in water and heat to boiling. Boil for 30 minutes.
How to Make Tomato Soup From Juice
- Pour 1-pint tomato juice in a 2-quart saucepan and heat to boiling.
- Sprinkle a dash of baking soda over the juice.
- Whisk together 2 tablespoons of corn starch and 1 cup of milk.
- Boil 1 minute, stirring constantly.
How to Use the Sauce
- Brown 1 pound ground sausage or hamburger while noodles are cooking. Drain fat off and add sauce. Reserve 1 cup water from noodles before straining.
- Mix water into the sauce. Heat to a boil. Reduce heat to simmer and simmer 5 minutes.
- Toss with noodles.
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© 2013 Sarah
