Pizza Sauce 2010

You will need a 5 gallon stock pot if you want to make the full recipe of pizza sauce. The recipe makes around 26-30 pints. Halving the recipe is easy if you don’t want to make this much!

Begin by heating a Dutch oven full of water to boiling on the stove. Wash and remove the stems from the tomatoes. Blanch the tomatoes by putting them into the boiling water for 30 seconds each (do this a few at a time). Immediately remove the tomato from the hot water. Strip the peel off the tomato and put it into a bowl. Repeat with the remaining tomatoes. When done, crush or blend the tomatoes as desired. We like smooth pizza sauce so I usually blend the tomatoes using a food processor or blender.

Add all of the crushed tomatoes, onions, peppers, garlic, and bay leaves to the 5 gallon stockpot and simmer for 1-4 hours. Sometimes the tomatoes are watery and need more cooking time to be reduced.

Add all of the remaining ingredients to the pot and simmer 30-60 minutes longer. If the sauce seems too thin, you may stir together 1/2 cup water and 1/2 cup cornstarch, add this to the pot, and boil to thicken.

Pour the sauce into clean, warm, sterilized jars and seal tightly using standard canning practices. The lids should snap down for a successful seal. If 1 or more don’t, just store those jars in the freezer. The ones that seal properly can be stored in the pantry.