This recipe for home water-bath canned tomato soup is from the Ball Blue Book. It is delicious. Make it in summer when tomatoes are cheap, because you need a lot for this recipe.
Want Cream of Tomato soup? When you go to heat this for serving, stir in ⅓ cup of SOS mix per pint / half-litre jar.
See also:
Tomato soup from home-canned tomato sauce
The recipe
If you wish to double or triple the batch, do the math first on paper.
Jar size choices: Either half-litre (pint) jars OR litre (quart) jars
Processing method: Either water-bath or steam canning
Yield: 4 x litre (quart) jars
Headspace: 2 cm (½ inch)
Processing time: Both size jars, half-litre (pint) and litre (quart), for 40 minutes. Adjust time for altitude when over 300 metres / 1000 feet. Do not steam can if your adjusted processing time would go over 45 minutes, because some less-expensive steam canner models cannot hold enough water.
Vine-fresh tomato soup
Ingredients
- 1 bell pepper (medium)
- 1 onion (medium)
- 2 tablespoons oil
- 2 cloves garlic (minced)
- 6 kg tomatoes (14 lbs / 10 quarts chopped)
- 4 tablespoons tomato paste
- 1 tablespoon sugar (optional)
- 1 tablespoon salt (OR non-bitter, non-clouding salt sub)
- 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
- lemon juice (bottled, OR citric acid)
Instructions
- Wash, stem, seed and coarsely chop the bell pepper; set aside.
- Wash, peel and coarsely chop the onion; add to bell pepper.
- Wash, peel and mince the garlic; set aside separately.
- Wash and core the tomatoes; chop into quarters. Set aside.
- Heat the oil in a very large pot.
- Add the onion and pepper, sauté for a few minutes until the onion starts to turn a bit translucent.
- Add the garlic add to pot.
- Sauté for another minute.
- Add the tomatoes.
- Stir mixture in pot.
- Set heat to medium.
- Cover pot, and bring to a boil, covered. This may take 30 to 40 minutes. Stir often to prevent bottom scorching.
- Once the mixture has released enough liquid to start boiling, reduce heat to a simmer.
- Simmer covered (sic) for another 30 to 40 minutes or until tomatoes have all broken down and mixture has begun to thicken a bit.
- Pass mixture through a food mill or strainer to remove tomato skins and seeds. Do this carefully, minding the very hot liquids.
- Return the strained tomato mixture to the large pot.
- Add the tomato paste, sugar, salt and pepper.
- Bring back to a simmer and let simmer for 15 minutes.
- Ladle hot soup into heated jars, either half-litre (pint) OR litre (quart).
- Leave 2 cm (½ inch) headspace.
- To half-litre jars, add ¼ teaspoon citric acid OR 1 tablespoon lemon juice.
- To litre (quart) jars, add ½ teaspoon citric acid OR 2 tablespoons lemon juice.
- Debubble, adjust headspace.
- Wipe jar rims.
- Put lids on.
- Process in a water bath or steam canner.
- Process either size jar for 40 minutes. Increase time as needed for your altitude.
Nutrition
Reference information
How to water bath process.
When water-bath canning or steam canning, you must adjust the processing time for your altitude.
How to steam can.
For salt substitute, Herbamare Sodium-Free was used as it is non-bitter and non-clouding.
What is the shelf life of home canned goods?
Recipe notes
- For the tomatoes, you can use any type of tomato.
- For the large pot, we used the Presto 16 quart pressure cooker / canner (just as a regular pot.)
- You will need about 10 quarts of tomatoes, measured after coring and chopping. If you have tomatoes to work with that are on the large side, that volume measurement may go to 12 quarts.
- This recipe is one of those recipes — you know the sort — which calls for 4 tablespoons of tomato paste which, annoyingly, is just about half of a standard sized tin of about 8 tablespoons. Why they couldn’t configure the recipe to use the whole tin they made you open is beyond us.
- The recipe suggests that your bell pepper be red, but using an orange or a green one likely wouldn’t shatter the universe.
- Instead of 2 cloves of garlic, you could use 1 teaspoon of minced garlic from a bottle of minced garlic.
- It will take about 30 to 40 minutes before the mixture comes to its first boil before you can start timing the first simmering time.
- The salt can be omitted, if you wish. It’s there for seasoning, not safety.
- You may increase the amount of sugar to taste (or use an alternative sweetener).
- You can safely add dry seasoning such as herbs.
- Do not skip the lemon juice/citric acid, or heat processing of the jars. Those things are there for safety.
- Do not add any more veg; do not add additional veg such as celery etc. That would lower the acidity level that they’ve tested to ensure that this is safe enough to can without a pressure canner.
Recipe source
Ball Blue Book. Muncie, Indiana: Healthmark LLC / Jarden Home Brands. Edition 37. 2014. Page 35.
Modifications made:
- Added seasoning suggestions including salt sub and other dried seasonings.
Nutrition information
Per 1 cup / 250 ml / 8 0z
- 76 calories, 443 mg sodium
Without salt, sodium is 16 mg per cup
* Nutrition info provided by MyFitnessPal
Sue B
Onion allergies here. Can I safely omit it and make up volume with tomatoes or bell peppers?
Gayla Stremming
Could I leave the pepper out?
Juliana
Would it be possible to can this soup in half pint jars? I’d like to have more flexibility in terms of serving size.
Juliana
Looks like you’ve already answered my question! Yes I can use half-pints. Awesome!
#5 in Safe Tweaking of Home Canning Recipes
https://www.healthycanning.com/safe-tweaking-of-home-canning-recipes/
Kellie
Can you safely increase the amount of sugar and still water bath can?
Healthy Canning
Yes. Sugar is just a dry seasoning in this recipe, and it’s safe to tweak dry seasonings. https://www.healthycanning.com/safe-tweaking-of-home-canning-recipes/
Sandy
Thank you for this safely canned wonderful tomato soup recipe! The only thing I changed was to add a bit more sugar.
Sandy
Thank you very much for this great recipe! I doubled the sugar and salt and added a 1/4 tsp of cloves and 1 tsp of basil, along with a tsp of dried parsley and celery leaves.
Collette
I would like to add some celery to this. would it throw off the acidity so I couldn’t can it with a water bath?
Healthy Canning
Use celery salt or celery powder instead. It’s fine to tweak recipes using dry seasonings.
Connie
Can I use celery seed?
Healthy Canning
Yes. See Safe Tweaking. https://www.healthycanning.com/safe-tweaking-of-home-canning-recipes/
Arlene Krause
I would like to add rice to this recipe before I can it. Do I need to change anything – water bath time.
Healthy Canning
Do not add any rice to this recipe before canning. If you wish to add (cooked) rice at the time you open a jar for use, that is fine.
Lisa Gay
Can you add cream when serving? I know not to add it before canning, but how about after? Will it curdle? Thanks!
Healthy Canning
Yes, you can add cream at time of use. A thick cream won’t curdle. You could thicken with some SOS mix that has been prepared thickly.
Melissa
Can I pressure can the soup? How long?
Healthy Canning
There is no need to pressure can this recipe. Pressure canning it will not be any faster or safer. The lab-tested directions are for water-bath and steam canning so follow those.
Debbie
This came out so good! I made it and canned it yesterday. Thanks for the recipe!