Mike’s
Bloody Mary Mix
by Mike Kissel
1 large kettle of washed, cored, and quartered tomatoes. Use
your favorite kettle, and fill to about ¾ full. My kettle
is pretty big, and I typically use about a ½ bushel or
so of tomatoes. Start cooking the tomatoes on medium heat. Once
they start to produce some juice, dip some out and combine the
following items in a blender:
5 large onions
1 large head of garlic – 8 or so cloves, or to taste
1 bunch of celery
6-8 green bell peppers
Basically, you just dipper out enough juice to put all of this
stuff through the blender, then dump it all back in with the
tomatoes. Continue cooking until the tomatoes are very juicy.
The time on this can vary, it depends on what kind of tomatoes
you are using. I like to use a big juicy type (not Romas), and
it’s really best if they are very ripe. They produce more
juice and cook down faster.
Once they have cooked down, strain them using your favorite
method. I use a foley food mill, with a fine sieve. This gets
out all of the tomato seeds and skins. Put the juice back into
the kettle, then add:
10 oz. horseradish
4-5 tsp. of red hot or other pepper sauce (or more or less to
taste)
3/4 c. sugar
2/3 c. lemon juice
2 T. salt
1/3 cup of Worcestershire sauce
Heat on medium heat until the sugar dissolves and it is all
well blended. Pressure can in quart jars, 30 minutes at 10 lbs.
pressure. Or, you can freeze it.
To serve, pour over ice and add vodka and additional pepper
sauce if desired. The classic stir stick is a stalk of celery,
but a big dill pickle spear or other pickled veggies work well
too.
