After I pureed enough tomatoes to make this year’s batch of spaghetti sauce, I had lots of puree left over, and I wanted to find something different to use it in. Along with canning plain tomato sauce, I stumbled across the Seafood Cocktail Sauce in Ball’s Complete Book of Home Preserving and thought I’d give that a whirl. I like store-bought cocktail sauce on shrimp and seafood, so why not make my own?

I followed this recipe exactly, and I’m guessing I may not have cooked it down long enough (I followed the recipe’s direction plus cooked a little longer) because I thought it was a very thin sauce, definitely not thick like store bought. However, the flavor was excellent, and I can see adding this to ketchup or even tomato paste to make it thicker – or maybe adding it to cream cheese to make a yummy dip.

Seafood Cocktail Sauce

13 cups fresh plum tomato puree

Zest and juice of 2 lemons

3 cloves garlic, minced

1-1/4 cups sugar

1 cup white vinegar

2 tablespoons salt

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

2 teaspoons dry mustard

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 teaspoon onion powder

1/2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper

3 cups finely grated and peeled horseradish

Prepare canner, jars, and lids.

Place half of the tomato puree in a large stainless steel saucepan. Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring occasionally. Maintaining a constant boil, add remaining tomato puree 1 cup at a time. Reduce heat and boil gently, stirring occasionally, until mixture is reduced by half, about 30 minutes. Add lemon zest and juice, garlic, sugar, vinegar, salt, Worcestershire sauce, mustard, cayenne, onion powder, and black pepper. Increase heat to high and bring to a full rolling boil, stirring frequently. Remove from heat and immediately stir in horseradish.

Ladle hot sauce into hot jars, leaving 1/2-inch headspace. Remove air bubbles and adjust headspace, if necessary, by adding hot sauce. Wipe rim. Center lid on jar. Screw band down until fingertip tight.

Place jars in boiling water canner, ensuring they are completely covered with water. Bring to a boil and process for 15 minutes. Remove canner lid. Wait 5 minutes, then remove jars, cool, and store.

Yield: Makes about nine 8-ounce jars

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