saved $30 by making home made tomato sauce in an instant pot

In this video I show you how to make tomato sauce in an instant pot and can or freeze it for long term storage. This is an excellent way to put excess tomatoes to good use so they aren't wasted. Even if you don't have a garden, you can still use this method to buy tomatoes in bulk from stores or farmers markets and save a huge amount of money verses buying tomato sauce.

Tomato sauce can be used to make spaghetti sauce, pasta sauce, pizza sauce, season chili, and used in a lot of recipes with only minor additional seasoning additions. At Walmart recently, the average cost of a 15 oz jar of tomato sauce, with additives and preservatives, was about $1.89. I made 11-1/2 x 16 oz jars for less than $3 saving myself approx $20 (this is determined by multiply 11.5 * 16 to get ounces, then divided that by 15 to see how many jars i would have to buy at Walmart, then multiplying that by 1.89 per jar, then subtracting the $3 of my total cost). If you used it to make just spaghetti sauce, the savings is even higher, since spaghetti sauce is $2.89 a jar, the savings would be about $30

Basic Tomato Sauce Seasoning Recipe: 6 lbs tomatoes (the sauce color will depend on tomato color, I use mixed tomatoes) 1/4 cup olive oil 1/4 cup water (may be more or less depending on how much liquid in tomatoes) 8 garlic cloves peeled 2 onions peeled and chopped 1/4 cup basil 1 tbsp salt 1 tbsp sugar 1 tbsp italian seasoning

Steps:

1. collect tomatoes, wash them, either 1/2 or 1/4 them
2. add olive oil and water to instant pot
3. add tomatoes to instant pot (6lbs fills my 8qt instant pot 3/4 full)
4. add seasoning to instant pot (use recipe above if you don't have one)
5. install instant pot lid, set timer for high pressure 25 minutes.
6. while instant pot is heating and sealing, prepare water bath canner, sterilize jars and lids (you can also freeze the tomato sauce in ziplock bags or containers)
7. When instant pot timer has completed, let it do a 10-15 minute natural release then manual release remaining pressure
8. use a blender, food processor, or immersion blender to puree tomatoes into sauce (i use an immersion blender listed below, I forgot to record this section of video)
9. ladle tomato sauce into jars, add the lids and bands, stick in water bath for 40 minutes making sure lids are covered by water. If freezing, allow the sauce to cool in instant pot, then add to containers and freeze
10. if canning, remove jars from canner after 40 minutes and then let them cool on a rack
11. label the jars

immersion blender I use: https://amzn.to/4dlkRYf instant pot I use: https://amzn.to/3X2Z3L7 pressure canner I use (I've had this almost 30 years): https://amzn.to/4fEGsfP

00:00 collect & wash tomatoes 00:10 prepare tomatoes & add liquids to instant pot 00:21 add tomatoes & seasoning to instant pot 00:31 add lid and set instant pot timer 00:43 prepare water bath canner - sterilize jars and lids 00:57 instant pot natural pressure release 01:07 puree tomatoes, add to jars, water bath 40 minutes 01:17 remove jars, make sure they sealed, label jars ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DX6JtInHus