Home-made Tomato Sauce

 Six kilograms of garden produce + sugar, vinegar and spices = 

a year's supply of tomato sauce

Tomato sauce (or ketchup as it is known in North America, where claims are made that it is a 'natural mellowing agent' which should be taken regularly for the sake of one's mental health ) is an essential condiment in the American kitchen and also in Australia and New Zealand. It is made and sold in vast commercial quantities. Possibly in larger quantities than the world's tomato harvest would warrant, as a lot of the commercial product is a suspiciously bright orangey-red and tastes more of chemical than of vegetable.

Luckily it is easy to make a year's supply of tomato sauce at home without much effort, using only best quality ingredients from the garden. Now is the time to make it, and so I was busy in the kitchen yesterday chopping, stirring and whizzing, as per the recipe below. This recipe is pretty much the one you will find in the Edmond's Cook Book. It is the one my mother made every year, and I now make every year, because I have never found a better one. 

I bottle it in re-used beer, juice and sauce bottles, and it keeps well unopened for up to two years. (When it is opened, keep it in the fridge or other cool place.) Our household of two adults could not possibly get through all the sauce in the picture, but fortunately I know a family where the children can not get enough of it, so it is all gone by the time sauce-making season comes around again.

TOMATO SAUCE

(makes c. 2.5 litres)

Ingredients

3.5 kg tomatoes

1 kg apples

6 large onions

1 kg white sugar

1 litre malt vinegar

125 g salt

1 t cayenne pepper

[and - tied in a muslin bag]

25 g cloves

1 t black pepper corns

1 t whole allspice 

Method

Cut up the tomatoes. Core and chop up the apples. Peel and chop the onions.

Put all the ingredients into a large preserving pan, and boil until the mixture reaches sauce consistency. This takes 2-3 hours.

Stir often in the second hour to stop the sauce burning on the bottom of the pan.

Whizz the sauce in a food processor until smooth, and bottle it in sterilised hot bottles.