Green Tomato Salsa is a delicious, tart salsa that’s a real crowd pleaser. You can take this as mild or as hot as you want.
This recipe is easily doubled or tripled. You’ll probably want to the second time you make it. All the jars from the first batch will have mysteriously vanished off the shelf.
This recipe is from both the Ball Blue Book and the Bernardin Guide to Home Preserving.
The recipe
Jar size choices: Quarter-litre (½ US pint / 250 ml / 8 oz) OR half-litre (1 US pint / 500 ml/ 16 oz)
Processing method: Either water-bath or steam canning
Yield: 6 x quarter-litre (½ US pint / 250 ml) jars
Headspace: 2 cm (½ inch)
Processing time: 20 minutes either size jar
Green tomato salsa
A delicious tangy salsa from green tomatoes
Ingredients
- 1.5 kg green tomatoes (measured after peeling and chopping coarsely. About 7 cups / 12 medium / 3 ¼ lbs)
- 250 g peppers (mixed, such as jalapeno, Habañero or Scotch bonnet peppers. ½ lb. About 5 to 10.)
- 400 g onion (peeled and chopped. 2 cups / ¾ lb. About 2 large.)
- 2 cloves garlic (finely chopped)
- 125 ml lime juice (bottled. ½ cup / 4 oz)
- 35 g coriander (aka cilantro. Fresh, finely chopped. About ½ cup loosely packed. 1 oz)
- 2 teaspoons cumin (ground)
- 1 teaspoons oregano (dried)
- 1 teaspoons salt
- 1 teaspoons ground black pepper
Instructions
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Wash the tomatoes. Blanch the tomatoes for about 60 seconds in boiling water, then plunge immediately into very cold water. Cut off and discard the peel. Chop. Measure to make up quantity specified in ingredients. Add tomato to a large pot. Wash and prep the pepper, onion and garlic, and add to same pot.
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Add the lime juice.
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Bring to a boil.
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Add in the remaining ingredients.
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Lower heat and simmer for 3 minutes.
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Spoon into quarter-litre (½ US pint) or half-litre (US pint) jars.
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Leave 2 cm (½ inch) headspace.
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Debubble, adjust headspace.
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Wipe jar rims.
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Put lids on.
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Process in a water bath or steam canner.
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Process either size jar for 20 minutes; increase time as needed for your altitude.
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Best after at least a month of jar time.
Reference information
How to water bath process.
How to steam can.
When water-bath canning or steam canning, you must adjust the processing time for your altitude.
Recipe notes
- Instead of the salt, you can use a non-bitter, non-clouding salt sub. We have found Herbamare Sodium-Free performs well in that regard.
Recipe source
Salsa Verde. In: Ball Blue Book. Muncie, Indiana: Healthmark LLC / Jarden Home Brands. Edition 37. 2014. Page 36.
Salsa Verde. In: Bernardin Guide to Home Preserving. Toronto, Canada: Bernardin Ltd. 2013. Page 58.
Modifications made:
- Changed onion from red onion to any onion
Note that the Bernardin Guide always said simmer for 5 minutes. The Ball Blue Book 2014 said simmer for 3 minutes. In summer 2016, Ball’s online version changed the simmering to 5 minutes to match Bernardin. This may be a case of a typo in the Blue Book that has been quietly corrected online.
The Bernardin version makes no mention of peeling, but we feel that for quality reasons if nothing else you would not want any tough green tomato skin bits in this salsa.
Another Ball recipe solidly in the safe zone, far below the upper safety cut-off of 4.6 pH
Nutrition information
Regular Version
Serving size: 4 tablespoons / 60 ml
- 12 calories, 100 mg sodium
- Weight Watchers PointsPlus®: 1 to 7 tablespoons: 0 points; 8 to 21 tablespoons: 1 point.
Salt-Free Version
Serving size: 4 tablespoons / 60 ml
- 12 calories, 3 mg sodium
- Weight Watchers PointsPlus®: 1 to 7 tablespoons: 0 points; 8 to 21 tablespoons: 1 point.
* Nutrition info provided by https://caloriecount.about.com
* PointsPlus™ calculated by healthycanning.com. Not endorsed by Weight Watchers® International, Inc, which is the owner of the PointsPlus® registered trademark.
* Herbamare ® is a registered trademark of the A. Vogel Corporation.
Melissa
I am wanting to use the end of my tomato crop – can I use both green and red tomatoes together in this recipe?
Healthy Canning
We’re getting back to you way too late for this answer to be of any use to you — sorry about that — but we’ll answer it for others. Green tomatoes are far more acidic than red tomatoes. There could be a chance that using red tomatoes might not provide the acidity safety level that the recipe makers were after. You could ask Ball directly and see what they think. Or, find a recipe that calls for red tomatoes, and use some of the green in that. After all, it’s always safe to increase the acidity in salsa recipes.
Vintage Cook
Can’t wait to try this! Can I substitute the bottled lime juice for bottled lemon juice or fresh squeezed lime or lemon?
Also can I just use sweet peppers from our garden or is the jalapeno necessary for the canning process?
Healthy Canning
Sweet peppers are fine. Ask Ball or Bernardin about the juice substitution questions.
Sarah
Great recipe with clear instructions thank you! I just pulled my jars out of the canner. I doubled the recipe (by weight) although I used less than double the peppers and a bit extra onions. I also roasted my green tomatoes before peeling and weighing and puréed the entire batch in my vitamix hoping to end up with a smooth salsa verde that can double as an enchilada sauce.
My yield was DRAMATICALLY different than yours. I have 9 pints and 3 1/2 pints (total of 10.5 pints). According to your notes I should have ended up with a total of 6 pints for a double recipe.
Any explanation for this?
Healthy Canning
Yields in home canning are always phase of the moon.
Shelby Renaud
I tripled the recipe since I had A LOT of green tomatoes. Unfortunately, the taste was super acidic. I still proceeded with the canning process and am hoping it’ll taste better in 1+ months.
Also, I used habanero peppers and would recommend you stick with 5 per batch. My salsa is pretty darn spicy. We love spice, so it’s fine, but I don’t think most people would be able to consume it.
Lyra
Would the recipe still be safe to can if I were to not include any of the cilantro/coriander?
Healthy Canning
That’s a low-acid ingredient, and it’s always fine to omit low-acid ingredients called for — you just never want to add any more than are called for.
Margaret Sharpe
I can only use quart jars. Unfortunately there is a shortage of small jars r/t Covid. Do you think they are ok if time is increased for water bath?
Healthy Canning
No. See jar sizes: https://www.healthycanning.com/jar-sizes/
Rooth
I accidentally weighed my tomatoes prior to coring and realized the weight was lower by about 10% of the requirement after blanching/coring. To compensate I added more lemon juice ( about 20% more). Do you think this is safe?
Healthy Canning
You will be fine. It may be a bit more soupy but you can drain upon opening.
Keith Cooper
Chop first, then scald….or scald, cool then chop?
Healthy Canning
Peel then chop. Good point, added to directions.
Callie
Can you use green cherry tomatoes?
Healthy Canning
Yes, you can.
stsabin
It would be nice if you could add pictures of what the chopped veggies look like before processing. Coarsely chopped, to me, in much larger than what I’m seeing the jars of finished salsa.
Healthy Canning
The tomatoes cook down during the boiling to what you are seeing in the jars. That’s why “coarsely chopped.” No need to go to the extra work of, say, finely minced, as they will cook down anyway.
Caroline Harris
Should I pressure can this recipe?
Healthy Canning
We list the method of processing in the top summary section on every recipe page.
Nancy MacDonald
going to try this recipe can you tell me do you know how long this will last in the bottles ???? after hot water bath.
Healthy Canning
Hi Nancy, see this piece on shelf-life of home-canned goods.
Brenda
This recipe should show 1.5 kg of green tomatoes, not 1.5 g
Healthy Canning
Thanks for catching that and letting us know Brenda. Lord, imagine trying to get six jars of this with only 1.5 g of green tomato. Not even my mother, who is a master at such things, could stretch it that far.