Urban Homesteading - We Canned Tomatoes!

When Co-conspirator Jess called me last week to ask if I wanted to come over and help her can the 800 tons of vegetables she had gathered up from her garden, I was:

1. Relieved - "Canning Vegetables" is pretty much the "Selling Cookies" of Urban Homesteading Merit Badges. Basic, assumed, and passed down from generation to generation with handfuls of anxiety and expectation. I was relieved, because if Jess showed me how to preserve fresh fruits and veg, I could take myself seriously as a Homesteader. I could then move on to all kinds of other old-timey things like making my own cheese and dehydrating tomatoes in the sun...
2. Anxious - Even though I have fond memories of my mom and her sisters and friends steaming up the house with their canning adventures in the summer when I was a kid and none of us ever died, the word BOTULISM kept rolling around in my ears.
3. Nostalgic - for the memories of my mom's huge canning pot, the weird looking canning sieve, and the beautiful Ball jars that held mom's favorite bread-and-butter pickles, stewed tomatoes, and raspberry jams (and later decorated my wedding).
4. Thankful - That Jess knows how to do this stuff, and that she is willing to teach! And also thankful that her neighbor gave her two big buckets of free tomatoes that I got to use, since my garden consists of a big basil plant in the window sill.

So anyway, I said YES, and last night I headed out to Western Springs to can it up with Jess and her friend Jessica. Jessica's mom was kind enough to let us invade her beautiful kitchen for the night (thank God for kitchen islands and counter space!).

We just made very simple crushed tomatoes. Just the 'maters, and a 1/4 tsp of citric acid powder in the bottom of each jar (to maintain consistent acidity. Or something. An extra precaution.) just before you add the hot tomatoes.

This isn't exactly a how-to. I'm definitely not confident enough in my knowledge to instruct anyone yet (remember botulism?) but think of this as an overview of the process. It's not as intimidating as it seems.

First, you have to prep your tomatoes.

Yay for free tomatoes!

Cut off the tough or questionable bits and give em' a quick pulse.

Then simmer them up in a pot.

While your tomatoes are prepping, heat up a CAULDRON canning pot of water:

Big Pot of tomatoes on the left, canning pot of water on the right.

Then take a nap while everything gets good and hot. (Just kidding, don't leave stuff boiling while you nap).

Sterilize your jars! (and your lids) Canning tongs are a must.

Jars taking a hot bath in the canning pot with the support of the jar frame.

Sterilized jars with citric acid powder in the bottom, patiently awaiting some action.

Using a canning funnel to get the tomatoes into the jar with surprisingly little mess.

Ta-da!

Go team!

There are a handful of other steps involved, like poking air bubbles out of the tomato-filled jars, reboiling the filled jars, and clapping with glee when your newly-canned tomatoes start to "PLINK!" as their vacuum seals officially clamp tight.

Note: Jess says that it is very important that newly canned jars REMAIN MOTIONLESS for 24 hours after they are tucked in (covered with a towel). No one she consulted could tell her why this is (our best guess is to give the vacuum seal a full 24 hours to convince itself that it is totally sealed), but in any case, I didn't get to bring my beautiful jars of red goodness home with me last night. Next time I see Jess, I'll get to carry home 11 jars of awesome.

We got started around 7pm and were tucking in the last few jars around 10:20ish. Simple, efficient, and yielded 23 jars. We just couldn't quite eek out the 24th jarful. Oh well. my share of 11 should keep our household in pasta sauce for most of the winter at least (for the cost of $8 worth of jars!).


Go forth and can!

Home Made Laundry Detergent (Brick)!

Co-Conspirator Jess and I finally got to have our first Homesteading Date this weekend. We successfully completed two DIY greeny projects, and we're excited to share them with you.

We'll start with Home Made Laundry Detergent!

So convinced were we of this fool-proof recipe that we made a triple batch.  Here's the recipe, via everyone's favorite vegan super-crunchy blogger, Bonzai Aphrodite.

Single Batch (we tripled these amounts)
1 1/4 cups vinegar
1 cup baking soda
1 cup washing soda
1 cup borax
1/4 cup liquid castile soap

Vinegar + sodas and borax

You have to start with the vinegar, then add the baking soda, washing soda, and borax. The mixture will fizz and foam (yay!). We found it valuable to have one person continually stirring (Jess), while one person measured and poured (me).

Once you have that mixture fizzing and spitting away, add the castile soap. We used Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap, peppermint scent. Not because we like our clothes to smell like Certs, but because we both had a bottle in this scent. Probably because that's the one they have most often at Trader Joe's. We added about 20 drops of lavender essential oil to the mixture to cut the very sharp scent of the castile soap. The mint scent wasn't unpleasant, just strong. The lavender had a nice mellowing effect.

This stuff really is magical.

AugDog came by to supervise the science experiment. He got bored quickly when he realized we didn't have anything that he could eat.

Once you've stirred in all your ingredients, you have completed about 1/3 of the necessary elbow grease. This recipe requires A LOT of stirring. Stop stirring, Bonsai warned, and you'll end up with a rock-hard brick of soap. So we stirred. And then stirred some more.
As you stir, the mixture will start to take on a sort of cakey appearance and texture. KEEP STIRRING!  We kept stirring until the soap easily formed a nice little cohesive clump of detergent in my hand when I scooped it out.

It looked like this when we stopped.

We split up our glorious home-made all-natural laundry soap and I took my portion home in a plastic storage container. I was sooooo excited to try it out.

And then I tried to scoop some out to do a load of laundry last night. And discovered that I had not a jaunty container of DIY laundry soap goodness, but a laundry soap brick.

Chisel or scoop?

I think it is still usable, I'll just have to break it up before use. Not ideal. I emailed Jess about the brick situation, and she said that her soap was still soft and cakey!  So maybe my soap just ended up baking in our hothothot apartment? Who knows. I'll try it out with some actual laundry and let you know how what happens.
Jess, any words of wisdom to share with the blogosphere?

Stay tuned for our escapades in home-made natural deodorant!