Canning Salsa

My father-in-law is well known among family and friends as a canner. His salsa is the best. It's flavor grew on me and I regularly crave it. Last weekend, I was fortunate to be allowed to can salsa with him. He gave me guidance and I did the work.

His recipe varies, but the result is always similar -- a sweet salsa with lots of bite. He's a man of few words and you know the latest salsa batch is good when he declares that, "It's not too bad."

Here's the recipe for the day.


All the ingredients are in the pot and I'm stirring them. At this point the kitchen smelled so good I wanted to bottle the smell for sale.


He has lots of old canning books laying around that are fun to look at. He also builds jigsaw puzzles.







The salsa is cooked and I'm transferring it to pint jars. We canned 24 pints that day.


Here are the jars with sealed lids sitting in hot water.


Here's a box of previously canned items: pickles, green beans, and tomatoes.


The George Jones music we listened to while canning added to a relaxed atmosphere that lasted all day for me, even after the canning was complete.

We tried a little salsa for lunch and it was declared as, "Not too bad."