Homemade Tomato Sauce (33 Pics)

The raw product! Roma and San Marzano tomatoes. We raw packed some tomatoes with the San Marzano(not pictured but I can upload them if you all want) and made sauce with the Roma tomatoes. We only made 8 bushels this year. We've made up to 55 bushels previous years.
My extended family are masons so we built a temporary fire pit for boiling tomatoes and sauce. We have a cinderblock on its side for increased air flow.
Fire Started!
To save time we use a trough to boil large quantities.
The wash bin.
The tomatoes are ready for their bath.
The tomatoes are rinsed  of any large pieces of dirt and cleaned with paring knives.


We used a piece of block to hold a hosein place to help agitate the tomatoes. It also allows for water to overflow allowing us to wash more tomatoes before dumping and refilling the bin all together.
Rinsed out the cases to hold the newly cleaned tomatoes.
Cleaned tomatoes.
My grandfather added onions to the tomatoes and the boiling process begins
The tomatoes and onions were added and boiled.

Green peppers, eggplant, and some grapevines nearby.
one of the many pots we used. (banana for scale)
covered the tomatoes to prevent the smoke from flavoring the tomatoes
tomatoes were strained and stored to help them continue to drain water
sauce machine
boiled and strained tomatoes. we store them in an pitched bread box to help drain before processing.
depending on the moisture left in the grounds we put them through the machine 1-2 more times


We moved the fire away from the trough instead of the other way around because we were concerned the handles strength might  be compromised.
My 4'10" Nonna stirring the tomato sauce. Salted to taste.
Our 2 pot holder method to carry the large pot to the kitchen for canning.

You cannot make authentic tomato sauce unless at least one person involved in processing is wearing socks with sandals.
Jars are put in the oven at 250 degrees until piping hot to prevent them from breaking when adding boiling sauce