![\"jars](\"https:\/\/growagoodlife.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/tomatoes-chilies-square.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>When you think of Tex-Mex or Southwestern food, the first ingredients that come to mind are tomatoes, chili peppers, and cumin. The combination of these flavors is what makes Mexican-style cuisine so unique and delicious.<\/p>
Rotel is a commercially canned tomato and green chili mix that is a pantry staple for making Mexican-inspired recipes. Cans of rotel are so convenient for adding flavor to dishes like tacos, casseroles, soups, or making salsas or dips.<\/p>
If you use a lot of diced tomatoes with green chilies in your recipes, try home canning your own with this safe canning recipe. This step-by-step tutorial will show you how to make homemade rotel using fresh ingredients and preserve shelf-stable jars with a pressure canner.<\/p>
What are Rotel Tomatoes?<\/h2>
Ro-Tel is a commercial brand of canned diced tomatoes and green chilies created by Carl Roettele, who owned a small canning company in Elsa, Texas, in the 1940s. The brand name “Ro-Tel” is a shortened spelling of his last name.<\/p>
While Ro-Tel was initially created as a shortcut for making chili con queso, it has evolved as a staple ingredient used to spice up Tex-Mex and Mexican recipes. Today, you can find Ro-Tel in most grocery stores across the US.<\/p>
The ingredients on the label are Tomatoes, Water, Chopped Green Chili Peppers, Salt, Calcium Chloride, Natural Flavor, Citric Acid, and Cilantro.<\/p>
How to Make Rotel<\/h2>
I have had requests over the years for a home canned rotel-type recipe. While there are no safe canning recipes specifically for diced tomatoes with green chilies, the “Stewed Tomatoes” recipe in the So Easy to Preserve<\/em> book is very close.<\/p> After several rounds of testing and a few tweaks, this safe canning recipe is an excellent replacement for commercial cans of rotel diced tomatoes and chilies. The best thing is, you can make it hot or mild by swapping out the types of peppers used. Here are tips for making homemade rotel:<\/p> This rotel copycat is made from fresh Roma tomatoes, Anaheim peppers, onions, dried cilantro, salt, garlic powder, and cumin.<\/p> As with any preserved product, use good quality vegetables at the peak of ripeness with no signs of rot or disease. Tomatoes should be evenly ripe with firm flesh, and the peppers and onions should have no damage or soft spots.<\/p> For this recipe, you can use any type of tomatoes, but plum or paste tomatoes produce firmer textured pieces after processing. Plum tomatoes are oblong and have thick meaty walls with small gel and seed pockets. Common paste tomatoes include Roma, San Marzano, or Amish Paste.<\/p> The recipe, as written, produces a close version of the original rotel with tomatoes and long green chilies. You can safely swap the type of fresh peppers in this recipe for different heat levels and flavor, but do not change the total amount of peppers, or the recipe may be unsafe for canning:<\/p> You can use any bulb onion, including yellow, white, or red. The commercial cans of rotel don’t have onions listed in the ingredients, so you can leave them out if you want. However, I suggest including them for flavor and the convenience of not having to chop additional onions when preparing meals.<\/p> You may alter the amounts of dried seasoning in this recipe. Depending on how you use your rotel, you may want to leave the seasoning out and then season to taste with fresh or dried herbs and spices when you prepare your recipe.<\/p> Having jars of tomato and green chili mix in your pantry is such a time saver because they are prepped and ready to open and add to your recipes. One of my favorite ways to use rotel is to make taco meat with ground beef, chicken, or turkey:<\/p> Ground Beef Taco Meat Recipe<\/strong><\/p> Other ways to use homemade rotel tomatoes and chilies are mixed in a quick corn salsa<\/a>, simmered in a slow cooker chili<\/a>, as a topping for chicken enchiladas<\/a>, and even blended into a restaurant-style salsa<\/a> if fresh vegetables are not available.<\/p> Since this recipe is a tomato-vegetable mix with no added acid, a pressure canner is required to achieve the high temperature necessary to kill organisms that can cause foodborne illness. If you don’t have a pressure canner, you can freeze the mixture instead.<\/p> A pressure canner is an excellent investment for home food preservation. I use a Presto 16-quart pressure canner<\/a>, but other trusted brands are Mirro and All-American.<\/p> Before you begin, review this document: “Preserving Food Using Pressure Canners<\/a>” at the National Center for Home Preservation<\/em> website, along with the instructions that came with your pressure canner. Make sure everything is clean and working correctly.<\/p> This recipe for rotel is adapted from the “Stewed Tomatoes” recipe from So Easy to Preserve<\/em><\/a>. I doubled the recipe, swapped the peppers for green chilies to replicate the commercial version, and adjusted the seasoning.<\/p> You can find the complete, printable recipe at the bottom of this article, but here are the detailed steps to making and canning rotel tomatoes:<\/p> You’ll need:<\/strong><\/p> This recipe calls for chopped tomatoes, peppers, and onions. This means you will peel, seed, and chop your vegetables before measuring using measuring cups.<\/p> Prepare the vegetables one at a time so you can measure each accurately. Chop into uniform, 1\/2-inch pieces and add to a measuring cup as you go until you reach the required amounts.<\/p> You’ll need about 24 pounds to get 16 cups of peeled, cored, seeded, and chopped tomatoes. Wash the tomatoes well under running water.<\/p> To remove the skins, bring a large pot of water to a boil and fill a large prep bowl with ice water. While working in batches, blanch the tomatoes in boiling water until the skins crack, and then plunge them into ice water to stop them from cooking.<\/p> While the tomatoes are cooling, empty the water out of the large saucepot, wash with soapy water, rinse well, and dry. Use this pot to heat your tomato mixture before filling the jars.<\/p> Once the tomatoes are cool enough to handle, remove the peelings and cores, scoop out the seeds, and chop them into 1\/2-inch pieces. Measure the chopped tomatoes and add 16 cups to a large saucepot.<\/p>About the Ingredients<\/h3>
Tomatoes<\/h4>
Peppers<\/h4>
Onions<\/h4>
Seasoning<\/h4>
Ways to Use Rotel<\/h3>
Steps for Canning Rotel Tomatoes and Green Chilies<\/h2>
Step 1: Gather Your Kitchen Equipment<\/h3>
Step 2: Prepare the Vegetables<\/h3>
Tomatoes<\/h4>
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