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Old September 19, 2016   #24
ContainerTed
Tomatovillian™
 
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Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: 6a - NE Tennessee
Posts: 4,538
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I choose to use raw tomatoes with the skins still on to do my juice. The price I pay for that is that I have to clean up the screen a bit more often. For me, it is just a part of the procedure that I developed that gives me the product I prefer.

I do that cleanup more often and that means I don't have to boil anything until I have my raw juice.

I am only making juice in the mid to late summer, so I can use my garden hose (right outside the kitchen door) to blast the screen clean in about 20 seconds.

I like the aroma of freshly squeezed tomatoes and use this as a quality check just before I apply the heat to the pots and begin reducing the water from the juice.

I remove the screen and the big red plastic screw and any tomato skins/meat under the feed area of the food mill. This is put aside for later use. After blasting things clean, I feed everything that falls out of the food mill back into the mill to make sure nothing is wasted. I guess I've decided that this is the price for producing a good product which will be delicious January and February come around.

I've often thought that I would have to clean out the screen even if I had an electric model that would eliminate my having to work out on the hand crank to get the juice. I also have decided that while I can easily afford one of the 250 dollar plus models, I'm not sure I would use it enough to justify the expense. I make tomato juice and applesauce during a short time period each year. What would the electric model being doing during the rest of the time except what the non-electric model is doing at the same time?

So, that's my cut on it. My $57 Back To Basics Food Mill, with its manual crank fills my needs. It also allows me to feel like I have a more "hands on" feeling about the making of my tomato juice or applesauce.

BTW, if you can make applesauce, you're only a couple of ingredients and a couple of steps away from "Apple Butter". Yes, it's easy/smeazy.

Have a good one.
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Ted
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Owner & Sole Operator Of
The Muddy Bucket Farm
and Tomato Ranch






Last edited by ContainerTed; September 20, 2016 at 10:18 AM.
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