Oven-Roasted Heirloom Vegetable Spaghetti Sauce & How To Preserve It (vegan, gluten-free)
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Weekend project: How to can your own oven-roasted spaghetti sauce (vegan, gluten-free)

Course: Main Course
Cuisine: Italian
Prep Time: 1 hour
Cook Time: 30 minutes
Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes
Servings: 5 1L jars

Learn how to can and preserve your own tasty oven-roasted spaghetti sauce to eat next winter

Ingredients

  • 5 organic sweet peppers (mixed colours), core removed, cut in 4
  • 7 lbs organic heirloom tomatoes mixed varieties and colours, cut in large chunks (I gently pushed out some of the seeds by gently squeezing the pieces of tomatoes between my thumb and fingers - no need to go crazy about removing all seeds or skin, you can if you want, but I never have time to remove the skin. haha)
  • 4 onions (medium size) peeled, coarsely minced
  • 4 stalks of organic celery cut into bite-size pieces
  • 3 large carrots cut into bite-size chunks
  • 4 large organic zucchini
  • 16 oz organic cremini mushrooms sliced
  • 3 Tbsp organic sun-dried tomatoes (not packed in olive oil) chopped in small pieces
  • 2 Tbsp oregano dry
  • 2 tsp dry thyme dry
  • 3 Tbsp oregano fresh
  • 1 Tbsp sea salt
  • 1/2 tsp black pepper
  • 1/3 cup organic red wine
  • 2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar

Instructions

  1. You'll need 4 or 5 x 1 L mason jars (wide mouth) with rust-free lids (the lids with the rubber should not be used twice for canning), as well as a very large canning pot & rack, plus canning tongs to take the hot jars out, and some tongs to take the lids out. Make sure everything you use is perfectly clean.
  2. Fill the canning pot with water, enough to have about 1" of water above the mason jars.
  3. With the empty mason jars in the pot, bring to a boil. (This will take a while! it took about 90 minutes for me)
  4. While you're waiting for the water to boil, you can prepare the sauce.
  5. Put all your prepared sweet peppers and about 1/4 of your tomatoes on 2 large cookie sheets lined with parchment paper (I use unbleached parchment paper in order to avoid toxic bleach).
  6. Drizzle with olive oil, sea salt, freshly ground pepper (to taste), and 1 Tbsp of dry oregano + 1/2 tsp of dry thyme.
  7. Bake in a 400F oven for about 45 minutes. Keep an eye on it every 10 minutes after the first 30 minutes to make sure it's not burning.
  8. In the meantime, start sautéeing the rest of the veggies in a very large pot with olive oil, starting with the onions, then adding celery, carrots, zucchini, mushrooms, and garlic (in that order), waiting 2-3 minutes in between each. You can add a bit more olive oil if it starts getting too dry at the bottom.
  9. **I recommend cooking the veggies in batches, and then splitting them in 2 very large pots, otherwise you will not have enough room in one pot for everything.**
  10. Add prepared tomatoes, the sun-dried tomatoes and 2 Tbsp of fresh oregano leaves, mix, cover, bring to a boil, then reduce temperature to medium-low, and cook for about 20 minutes.
  11. Add the oven-baked vegetables, add the sea salt and the white wine, and cook for an additional 10 minutes. Mix the balsamic vinegar in, then reduce the heat to low.

  12. With a handheld mixer, very carefully blend your sauce. (CAUTION: be very careful not to splash as the liquid will be very hot)Get your canning tongs and utensils ready, with a few clean dish towels ready.
  13. You'll need an area ready to receive hot jars (I used a cooling rack set over a clean dish towel).
  14. Make sure you set all of this up ahead of time, because thing will go very fast once the process is started. ;)
  15. Once the water is boiling (be careful!), set the timer for 10 minutes, this will sanitize the jars. Boil the lids in a separate, smaller pot. Boil for 10 minutes. Be very careful with boiling water that might splash.
  16. After 10 minutes, reduce the temperature to medium heat, and using the special canning tongs, carefully remove the mason jars from the boiling water, one at a time. Carefully empty the hot water in the sink. One at a time.
  17. Get the lids out too and put on a clean dish towel.
  18. As quickly as you can, fill each jar with the spaghetti sauce, leaving about an inch of space at the top.
  19. Still working as quickly as you can, screw the lids on each jar, tight but not too tight, and carefully return each jar to the hot water canning pot (with a rack at the bottom) using the special rubber canning tongs.
  20. Add extra water if you don't have at least an inch of water over the jars.
  21. Increase the temperature and bring back to a boil, then set the timer for 15 minutes.
  22. After the 15 minutes is done, turn the heat off, and leave the jars in the pot for an additional 5 minutes.
  23. Then remove all the jars carefully and leave on a cooling rack, untouched. As they cool down, you will start hearing little "pops" (probably after 15-20 minutes or so), that means it's being sealed. After you've heard the "pop", you can tighten the screw lid a bit more. Then leave untouched for several hours until fully cooled down.
  24. Once completely cold, you can put away to store in your pantry for many months, up to a year or more.

Note: I do not believe anyone should worry about counting calories, but here is the nutritional information for one serving
Calories: 294kcal | Fat: 2g | Sodium: 1515mg | Potassium: 3093mg | Carbohydrates: 60g | Fiber: 17g | Sugar: 35g | Protein: 13g | Vitamin A: 15715% | Vitamin C: 278.1% | Calcium: 249% | Iron: 6.2%