Green Tomato Relish Recipe (Can or Freeze) (2024)

Course: Sides

Cuisine: American

Method: Freezer Friendly

Diet: Dairy Free, Egg Free, Gluten Free

• 4 pounds green tomatoes
• 2 pounds onions (white or yellow)
• 1 ½ pounds red bell peppers
• 1 pound apples (like Granny Smith)
• 12 cloves garlic
• 2 cups apple cider vinegar (unpasteurized)
• 1 ½ tablespoons salt
• 8 jalapeños
• 4 tablespoons cilantro
• 2 teaspoons cumin

Make Relish

• Remove stem and core from green tomatoes and roughly chop into ½ inch or 1 inch pieces.

• Add to a large pot with heat turned off while you prepare rest of ingredients.

• Peel, roughly chop and add onions to pot.

• Remove stem and seeds from red bell peppers and roughly chop as well.

• Remove core from apples, discard, and roughly chop (including peel).

• Mince garlic and add to pot along with onions, red bell peppers, and apples.

• Add apple cider vinegar and salt to pot and set over high heat. When vinegar comes to a boil turn down to low and simmer for 1 hour and 15 minutes while stirring occasionally.

• While relish is simmering finely chop jalapenos (only remove/discard seeds for half of them), chop cilantro, and set aside. I highly recommend wearing latex or rubber gloves while chopping the jalapenos otherwise your hands could sting for a few hours… I know this from experience!

Optional: Prepare Cans (if canning)

• Fill canning pot three-quarters full with water, cover, and set over high heat until it comes to a boil. You can either sterilize your jars in this pot of boiling water for 10 minutes or by using the heated drying cycle in your dishwasher. It’s important to keep the jars hot and sterilized until ready for use. Be sure all canning utensils have been sterilized in hot soapy water as well.

• Fill a small pot with water to sterilized lids and bands. Water for lids/bands should be hot at about 180 degrees F, but not boiling. Leave them in hot water (on simmer) until ready for use. If water gets cold remove lids/bands and heat up water to 180 degrees F again before adding them back in.

Finish Relish

• After the 1 hour and 15 minutes is up the relish should have boiled down a bit.

  

• Add the jalapenos, cilantro and cumin to pot and simmer for 5 more minutes.

• Use either an immersion blender or potato masher to process the mixture into a small dice, but not a puree. I highly recommending owning an immersion blender if you don’t have one already…it’s perfect for pureeing soups and other recipes like this relish without having transfer batches back and forth between a blender, which makes a mess!
  

To Freeze

• If you are freezing, this point divvy up relish among freezer safe containers and once cool transfer to freezer.

  If using glass jars be sure to leave enough room at the top for the relish to expand during freezing. You can skip the remaining steps.

To Fill Jars for Canning

• Turn relish back up to a boil.

• Remove jars from hot water, shake out excess water, and set near pot.

• Using a sterilized ladle and funnel, fill the jars, leaving ¼ inch headspace at the top.

• Slide a non-metallic utensil into jar to remove any air bubbles.

• Wipe off rim of jar with a clean cloth.

• Using sterilized tongs (or magnetic lid lifter) carefully place lids onto filled jars. You can touch top of lids once they are on jar, but do not touch underneath or on inside of jar to keep everything sterilized.

• Screw on bands by only touching the outside, although bands should not be too tight.

To Process Jars

• Bring water in canning pot back up to a boil.

• Using jar lifter carefully transfer jars to canning pot. Jars should not directly be touching the bottom of the pot and instead be separated either by a canning rack or simple dish towel.

• Once water comes back to a boil start timing from that moment and process jars for 15 minutes.

• After time is up using jar lifter carefully remove jars from boiling water and transfer them to a clean dish towel. Let jars rest until they cool.

• If jar lids haven’t already popped/sealed you should hear the sound… and if a jar doesn’t seal within 24 hours transfer it to fridge and eat within 3 – 4 weeks.