TOMATOES. 149 



and the canning master who can accomplish this and 

 not destroy the special flavor of tomatoes is successful. 

 For home use tomatoes may be canned as easily as oth- 

 er material. The fruit is brought in, pared or otherwise 

 prepared, as for the table, and then subjected to heat 

 not quite to the boiling point, but just at the verge. They 

 are then kept in this condition for an hour or two, and 

 while in this heated condition transferred to the jars. 

 These jars, their covers, and all connected with them, 

 should previously have been subjected to a tempera- 

 ture at least equal to boiling water. It is not suffi- 

 cient to rinse them in hot water, or merely to scald 

 them, but they should be kept in boiling water for 

 several minutes, or even half an hour, then, imme- 

 diately, without allowing to cool, the hot tomatoes are 

 transferred to the cans, which are immediately sealed, 

 air tight. If these precautions are observed to a let- 

 ter, it will be found that a very small per cent. , if any, 

 of the fruits will spoil if they are kept for a year or 

 more. As stated before, the principle in canning is 

 simply this: We must kill off all living organisms in 

 the cans ; all living organisms in the fruit, and then 

 fill the cans with tomatoes, close them up without in- 

 troducing any of these organisms. As fermentation 

 and decay are omnipresent, falling into everything 

 that is left open for a minute, we will see that it is 

 necessary to keep the temperature high enough to kill 

 them, up to the very minute our material is canned, 

 and then keep it from being opened again. It is im- 

 material whether the fruit is sweetened at the time the 

 canning is done or not. The keeping qualities will 

 still be the same. 



