How to blanch your tomatoes

Before canning, freezing or cooking fresh tomatoes, you'll want to get the skins off. You do this by blanching the tomatoes. Here's how I do it:

Use two large soup pots. Fill one with water and bring to a boil. Fill the other pot with ice and water. Wait for the water to get really cold. Use fresh, clean tomatoes. Hint: Buy a bag of ice.

This is an action shot of tomatoes spending
about a minute in the boiling water. You will see the skins split,
at which time you transfer them to the ice water with long tongs.

The ice water stops the cooking process that would
continue were you not to put in ice water. Be sure to keep
the tomatoes in the ice water until they're no longer warm.

Transfer your tomatoes to a colander. The skins
will slip off and you will core the stem end.

Now you can run the tomatoes under water
to wash out the seeds. Your tomatoes are ready
for freezing, canning or tonight's supper.