It is a great day to do some canning!  On today’s to-do list I’m planning to can tomato juice, whole tomatoes and cucumber- mint jelly.  My family loves the whole tomatoes and tomato juice for chili, goulash, and a few random recipes I have that call for whole tomatoes.  And farmer Brown loves to drink the tomato juice right out of the jar!  The cucumber-mint jelly tastes great on lamb chops, or simply drizzled over cream cheese as an appetizer.

To be honest my first plan was to make pasta sauce, but I had to change my plans quickly after one critical error.  I bought a new kitchen gadget for myself, a strainer/grinder for my mixer.  Thought it would be so helpful in preparing sauces and juices for making a lot of what is on my canning list.  And it will, but you cannot use the strainer to make pasta sauce, it turns the tomatoes into juice- hence the tomato juice I’m canning today! 

Watching the strainer was amazing!  While watching it I thought how jealous my grandmother would be to have the ability to make tomato juice without needing to beat them by hand, and strain them through some cheesecloth (or whatever they used!).  I have the ability to do so much more than she could ever imagine.  I can prep veggies one night, and can them the next night,-thanks in part to my extra refrigerator. I can have my stove burners going all day and not break much of a sweat because of central air. And I cannot begin to list all the gadgets in my kitchen that allow me to prep and can so much faster than Grandma could have even conceived.  I wonder what the next generation of canners will have to make their lives easier...

Cucumber-mint jelly finished product