Homemade is best in part because of quality, but creating a meal all from scratch takes some time. Pre-making meal elements means in a snap, you can have a home cooked meal without packaged helpers. The other day I made pork bbq sandwiches on homemade buns, squash casserole, coleslaw, and roasted potatoes. My pork bbq, squash, potatoes and coleslaw were all canned, so no par-cooking squash, potatoes, making the coleslaw, or pork bbq. This gave me plenty of time on a busy day to make homemade buns.

My family enjoys homemade pizza, so I make elements for that meal in advance as well. For instance, I double my pizza dough recipes and freeze into portions. I have frozen chopped vegetables, sausage and ground beef crumbles for at-the-ready toppings, and this canned pizza sauce. When I’m crunched for time, I just pull out my frozen dough and toppings, pop open some pizza sauce, and I have a head start to homemade pizza.

To economically build up your pizza topping supply, freeze bits of leftover veggies like bell peppers, mushrooms and onions and store in a gallon bag. I’m guilty of taking little pieces of unused vegetables, storing them in baggies and forgetting about them in the fridge so this helps me waste less.

Let’s talk about the sauce ingredients. I use 6 lb. 6 ounce cans of crushed tomatoes from Costco for about $3.60 each, and 3 cans of tomato past for 29 cents each. This equals $8.07 for the tomatoes. If I rounded the cost, including the other ingredients to $9.50 that’s 63 cents a jar of pizza sauce. You can’t get the quality or price in the store.

Each time, I make two canners s of pizza sauce because I always make 2 pizzas for dinner. Each pint will get me one pizza, so that’s 15 pizzas or 7 dinners plus one. You can cut this recipe in half if desired. Feel free to play around with the listed ingredients to taste, as it won’t affect the canning times I took from Ball. You will notice I have a 1 1/2 pint jar in the picture, and I upped the time for 40 minutes there. Actually the 1 1/2 pint jar is the perfect size for two pizzas, but those are no longer sold by Ball. With the pints, there’s always a little extra left.

I used half Harvest Guard re-usable lids and half Ball lids. When I’m canning food I plan to use quickly I typically use all re-usable, but I was in a hurry and didn’t want to fuss with boiling lids.

Make a pizza kit in your freezer, including frozen pizza dough, cheese, toppings and seasonings. Put this together with a jar of sauce, and give as a gift – either a gift to someone else, or yourself when you don’t feel like spending time in the kitchen.

Homemade Canned Pizza Sauce
Yield 15 pints

1/2 cup olive oil
1 large onion, diced
1 TBSP crushed red pepper
5 heaping TBSP minced garlic
2 industrial cans (6 pounds, 6 oz) of crushed tomatoes
3, 6 oz cans tomato paste
1/4 cup dried basil
3 TBSP dried oregano
1 TBSP salt
3/4 cup sugar

Saute onions and garlic in olive oil until onions start to soften.

Add remaining ingredients, and bring to a simmer.

Stir to ensure paste has been incorporated. Taste to adjust to your tastes.

To can, fill pint jars leaving 1/2 inch head space. Clean rims of jars, and affix lids and rings.

Can for 35 minutes in a water bath canner.