Concerning this same book, Put Em Up!, I made her Charred Chili Salsa last year. It was everyone's favorite, but I have three questions. Having followed the recipe exactly (including weighing ingredients) I found it made much more salsa than stated. Why does this happen? It makes me crazy. Second, when I made additional batches I eliminated the 1/2 cup cilantro and replaced it with 1 tablespoon ground cumin. I also added three cloves garlic (put through a press.) Was I playing with fire or does the recipe remain safe for water-bath? Finally, can I process this in pints? Here is the recipe and it really is a stunner. I have shortened some instuctions (i.e. charring chilies) for the sake of brevity. 2 pounds chili peppers 5 pounds tomatoes, peeled, cored and diced 1 pound onions, diced 1 1/2 cups vinegar 2 tablespoons salt 1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro. Char chilies, skin and cut into 1/2 inch dice Combine all ingredients except the cilantro and bring to boil. Reduce heat and simmer 15 minutes to thicken. Add cilantro and remove from heat. Water-bath in 1/2 pint jars for 20 minutes.

This is a cooking recipe, not a canning recipe. Only safe, current recipes designed for canning from a reliable source should be canned. Otherwise you put yourself at a risk for botulism. Bottled lime juice or bottled lemon juice is used in some recipes. It is twice as acidic as 5 % acidity vinegar. You can always use bottled lemon or bottled lime juice where vinegar is called for, but never use vinegar in place of the bottled lemon/lime juice. Bottled juice is used since it has to meet an acidity standard to be sold. Fresh lemons/limes vary in acidity and will not be strong enough for safety. I am sending you a link to information and recipes. If you want your salsa recipe it needs to be frozen. Just plain tomatoes without any other added low acid things will take 1 Tablespoon of bottled lemon juice to process them. Here is a link that might be useful: Safe salsa preserving.

Hello Dave (or anyone else) you seem pretty knowledgeble in the area of canning and wanted your advice. I wanted to try this recipe, but wanted to make more changes taking into consideration what you have said and suggested. I have a ball caning book and can't find that recipe in it or anywhere else on line. The one I did find that resembles this recipe calls for 6 lbs of tomatoes (or 10 cups), not 12 lbs. 12 lbs seems like alot of tomatoes. Was that an error? I mean, did you really mean 6 lbs and not 12 lbs? I have some questions and would appreciate your help. 1.) Is there any reason that you can't just chop up the tomatoes leaving the skins & seeds in the salsa? I never take off the skin or remove the seeds--seems like such a waste of tomato to me. 2.) I also leave the seeds in my hot peppers because I want HOT HOT HOT salsa. Is this okay as long as the measurements include the seeds? 3.) Recipes always say not to change the amount of peppers or onions but you can change the types of onions or peppers. I'm wondering if you can reduce the amount of peppers or onions or garlic as long as you keep the vinegar or lemon juice the same? Since I like HOT HOT HOT salsa...I like to use hot peppers so I need fewer of them. I really don't like recipes that call for lbs. or a number of vegetables such as this recipe. Since the size of a pepper or tomato or onion ranges in size...I prefer an exact measured amount to be listed in a recipe. I do like it if they give an approximate number of the veggie in perentheses next to the measured number so you have an idea of how much you need...that's always nice :) In my opinion, this recipe calls for too little vinegar for the amount of stuff in it--as you pointed out to the poster of the recipe. I changed up the recipe and put it in exact measurements and wanted your advice on it. The changes I made are... 1.) I omitted the jalepeno peppers. 2.) I decreased the amount of garlic...since 1 clove of garlic is approximately 1/2 tsp...and the 15 cloves in the recipe = approximately 7.5 tsps and there are 3 tsps. to 1 TBSP...I just made it 2 TBSPS. 3.) I added one more cup of pineapple to make it a total of 4 Cups. 4.) I went with 10 cups of tomatoes (6 lbs.--not 12 lbs.) 5.) I omitted the option of chili flakes since I use hot peppers with their seeds. 6.) I doubled the amount of vinegar...and instead of vinegar used equal portions of lemon and lime juice) 7.) I used hot peppers chopped with seeds included (8 of them, plus two habeneros and they totaled 1 cup and I did not soak them in hot water and puree them) Here is my changed version of the recipe: 10 Cups chopped tomatoes (I use the whole tomato--skin and seeds) 3 Cups chopped onions 2 TBSP chopped garlic 1 Cup chopped hot peppers (I use a mix of red/green sorreno/chili peppers and habenero's including the seeds) 4 Cups chopped pineapple 1/4 Cup fresh cilantro 1 TBSP salt 1 1/2 Cups lemon and lime juice (3/4 cup each) What do you think of the changes? Carol, from Idaho :)

just realized you're talking orange. Annie says her recipe was tested without the sauce or salsa. So if you use orange tomatoes, you have orange salsa. there's also a version called Peach Twist, but you could make Annie's Pineapple Twist Salsa. I think I'd use fresh pineapple AnnieÂs Peach (Pineapple) Twist Salsa Yield: about 6 pints Harvest Forum 1 quart tomatoes, skinned, chopped, drained 1 quart peaches, skinned, pitted and diced, including juice (or pineapple) 2 1/2 cups onion, chopped 1 1/2 cups green peppers, chopped 3 to 5 jalapenos, chopped fine 6 cloves garlic, minced 4 teaspoons cumin, ground 2 teaspoons pepper 2 tablespoons canning salt 1 cup cider vinegar brown sugar to taste Mix all ingredients, bring to a boil and cook 10 minutes. For boiling water bath, process 15 minutes for pints.