I both canned and froze pasta sauce last year, and I much preferred the frozen sauce. You have much more control over what you can put into the sauce you plan to freeze, no issues with worrying about safety like canning. Digdirt (ie Dave) gave me this recipe 2 yrs ago when I was strictly freezing, and it's become my #1 recipe. 20 tomatoes, halved and seeded 1/4 cup olive oil 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt 1 teaspoon pepper 1 cup finely diced onion 2 teaspoons minced garlic 1 tablespoon finely chopped oregano 1 tablespoon finely chopped thyme 1 cup white wine Preheat oven to 325. In a large roasting pan, place tomato halves, cut side up. Sprinkle with oil, salt and pepper, onion, garlic, and herbs. Bake tomatoes for 2 hrs. Check tomatoes after 1 hr and turn down heat if they seem to be cooking to fast. Then turn oven to 400 and bake another 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and process through a food mill. Discard skins. Put tomatoes in a large non-reactive pot and add white wine and bring to a boil, reduce to low head and cook to desired consistency. Freeze in containers. I also tried white wine instead of red wine, thinking red wine was more "Italian". But, the white wine gives a much better taste, in my opinion. Enjoy your tomatoes and post often. I have learned so much from the wealth of experience on this site!

harriet, welcome! congratulations on your tomato bonanza. No, you don't have to "pressure cook" the tomato sauce if you're going to freeze it. You can just make it --- any recipe you want, including meat, veggies, whatever, if it's to be frozen --- cook it as much as you like till it's how you want it, then put it into containers and freeze it. ("Pressure canning" and "Water bath canning" are for if you want to store the sauce in jars that do NOT go in the freezer --- just stay on the shelf, like jars from the store. If you want to try that, then you need to follow a tested recipe to be sure that it's safe for home caninng. Get the Ball Blue Book for a start! But if you are going to freeze it, you can make any recipe you want.) Yes, the containers can be regular canning jars. But they don't have to be jars at all --- they can be almost anything, in fact: little plastic tubs with snap-on lids, or even freezer bags wit the tops close tightly. BUT whatever you use, be sure to leave a little extra space at the top (like a half inch) because the sauce will expand a bit when it freezes and you don't want to pop the top off! You should let the sauce cool to almost room temperature before freezing it just so it doesn't warm up your freezer too much. You can let it cool first, then put it in the containers --- I find this easier than pouring in hot sauce. Your steps are fine. You probably want to cut out the tough "core" in the top centre of each tomato when you chop it. If you don't like the seeds you can take those out too at that time, but some people don't care (I leave 'em in). Hope this helps. Welcome to the forum. Good luck with yoru tomato sauce project! Zabby

There are several ways to cook fresh, raw tomatoes down into a sauce that can be frozen. Here's how I do it: I wash, core and quarter the tomatoes (or cut smaller ones in half) and run them through my tomato press/strainer using the 'sauce' screen. That gives me what is essentially thin, watery tomato juice. Then I put it in a heavy stockpot and simmer it until the volume is reduced down by about 50%. That gives a fairly thick sauce. You can reduce the volume only by about 30-35% if you want a thinner sauce. I stir fairly often. How long it takes will vary depending on the size of the pot, how full it is and how watery your tomatoes were to begin with, but it is not unusual for me to simmer it for 6 to 8 hours with a normal big stockpot, or up to 10 hours if I am using my 21-quart canner as a stock pot for boiling down tomatoes. I am starting out with about 40-50 lbs. of tomatoes per batch though, and that plays a part in how long it takes to boil down. A smaller quantity of tomatoes will boil down a little more quickly. When it has reached the thickness I desire, I pull the pot off the burner and let it cool. Once the sauce has cooled, I ladle it into plastic freezer storage boxes, leaving 1/2" headspace. I label it "Tomato Sauce" plus the date and put it in the deep freeze. I use the Arrow brand Freezer Boxes sold on the canning aisle at Wal-Mart. Our Wal-Mart is always sold out of them at this time of year, but our Tractor Supply Store usually has them in stock all the time during canning season. If you do not have a tomato press/strainer, you can either puree your tomatoes in a food processor or you can chop the tomatoes into about 1" size pieces, cook them, and then strain out the seeds using a colander or strainer with fine mesh or small holes. Later on, you can make whatever you want...pasta sauce, soups, stews, etc. from your frozen sauce. Just thaw it and use it. If you want to can the tomato sauce in canning jars instead of putting the sauce in freezer boxes, you'll have to add an acidifying agent, usually lemon juice, for safety reasons. The recipe for canning tomato sauce can be found at the linked website. This recipe for canning tomato sauce can be used for making sauce to freeze, but you can skip adding the lemon juice since you're freezing instead of canning. If what you actually want is to go ahead and make full-fledged spaghetti sauce and then freeze it, there is a recipe for that in the Ball Blue Book that is separate from the standard canned spaghetti sauce recipe. That recipe might be at the Ball website (freshpreserving.com). Sammy, Reducing the tomato juice via simmering or boiling takes care of the issue of the sauce being too watery. It also intensifies the flavor. Mia, The most important thing about the Annie's Salsa recipe is to follow the directions exactly and make only the substitutions that are specifically stated as being allowed--such as substituting ReaLemon or ReaLime juice for some or all of the vinegar, or substituting some hotter pepper for some or all of the jalapenos, as long as the volume of peppers remains the same as what is stated in the recipe. There's a million threads about Annie's Salsa on the Harvest forum because the recipe has been around a while, and there have been some modifications done over the years, based on the advice of the ag extension service that worked with Annie to test the recipe for safety. While being creative and adding your own special touch to recipes when cooking is fun, you cannot employ that creativity in canning because any change you make that could affect density or pH of the product being canned could compromise its safety. That's why everyone on the Harvest forum lists the approved changes when the recipe is discussed--to ensure people don't make unapproved changes. Hope this helps, Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Preserving Tomatoes

Here is the recipe I've been using for years. 1/2 C olive oil 4 medium onions diced 16 lbs tomatoes, peeled and diced 2 12 oz cans tomato paste 1/4 c sugar 1/4 c chopped parsley 2 tbs oregano leaves 2 tbs salt 2 tsp basil 3/4 tsp cracked pepper 2 bay leaves parmesan cheese Cook onions and garlic in oil until tender, add tomatoes and remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, cook partially covered for 2 hours. I use fresh herbs from the garden and don't pay much attention to the quantity. So I probably put in more than the recipe calls for.