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Old August 11, 2011   #54
TomNJ
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Join Date: May 2009
Location: Floyd VA
Posts: 767
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Good first effort, and thanks for sharing.

The easiest way to make tomato puree is to just wash, trim, and cut raw tomatoes into pieces (about the size of a small paste tomato), run them through the Victorio, and boil them down to your desired texture. I did 20 lbs of tomatoes yesterday and the milling took less than 10 minutes.

Your picture of the Victorio shows a salsa screen installed (1/4" holes), not the pumpkin screen (1/8" holes). The salsa screen will semi-clog with skins after about 10 lbs of tomatoes, but takes only a few minutes to remove, clean, and reinstall. The tomato screen (1/16" holes) will run some 20-30 lbs of tomatoes without clogging. The screen type is engraved on the large end of the screen.

Also you should add reconstituted lemon juice (equivalent to lemon juice strength), not concentrated juice. Citric acid is even better and only requires 1/2 teaspoon per quart.

Cooking the sauce down to sauce thickness should eliminate the separation you are seeing in the jar. This problem occurs mostly when making tomato juice or thin sauces, and can be avoided by heating some chopped tomatoes first, then adding the rest slowly. Try shaking your jars when cool to see if it stays together.

Personally, I would discard water separated from the freezing - just not worth the effort of boiling it down, IMHO.

Keep up the good work - it gets easier over time.

TomNJ
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