Cherry tomatoes pile up faster than most kitchens can eat them. The useful question is not “Can I can them?” — you can — but which form belongs in a jar: whole tomatoes for cooking, pickles for snacking, crushed tomatoes for sauce, or salsa. Each path uses a different tested method. Mix them up and you leave safe acidity and heat penetration behind.
Use cherry tomatoes in any tested tomato or pickle recipe that matches the style you want. Do not invent a new combination of oil, garlic, balsamic, and roasted fruit and assume a water bath will make it shelf-stable.
Choose the jar by how you cook
| What you want later | Best style | Typical method | Prep load |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pasta, soup, curry, shakshuka | Whole or halved tomatoes packed in water | Water bath or pressure | Medium |
| Toast, cheese boards, salads | Pickled cherry or grape tomatoes | Water bath, short time | Light |
| Pizza, lasagna, chili base | Crushed tomatoes or thin sauce | Water bath or pressure | Heavier |
| Chips and tacos | Tested salsa formula | Water bath, pints only | Heavier |
| Weeknight “dump and heat” | Avoid oil-roasted or creamy versions | Freeze those instead | — |
Whole packed tomatoes are the most flexible pantry item. Pickles are the fastest and the least likely to turn mushy if you use a short process. Sauce and salsa take more time up front and reward you later.
Safety rules that apply to every cherry tomato canning recipe
Tomatoes sit near the line between high-acid and low-acid food. Variety, ripeness, and growing conditions all move pH. That is why current USDA and National Center for Home Food Preservation guidance requires added acid in whole, crushed, and juiced tomatoes even when you pressure-can them.
Add one of these to each jar of plain tomatoes, crushed tomatoes, or juice before filling:
- Bottled lemon juice: 1 tablespoon per pint, 2 tablespoons per quart
- Citric acid: 1/4 teaspoon per pint, 1/2 teaspoon per quart
- 5% vinegar: 2 tablespoons per pint, 4 tablespoons per quart
Use bottled lemon juice, not fresh. Bottled juice has a known acidity. Fresh lemons do not. Citric acid changes flavor less than vinegar. Never reduce the acid to “taste milder.” You can add a pinch of sugar when you open the jar.
Do not add extra oil, butter, cream, flour, cornstarch, extra onions or peppers beyond a tested salsa or sauce formula, or roasted tomatoes sitting in olive oil. Those products belong in the freezer.
Do not skip altitude adjustments. Water boils at a lower temperature as elevation rises. Processing time (water bath) or canner pressure (pressure canner) must increase.
Yellow, orange, and Sungold types can replace red cherry tomatoes in these recipes. Color does not remove the need for acid.
How many tomatoes you need
NCHFP yield figures for whole or halved tomatoes are about 13 pounds for a canner load of 9 pints, or 21 pounds for 7 quarts — roughly 1½ pounds per pint and 3 pounds per quart.
Cherry tomatoes pack tighter than large slicers, so a pint often holds a little more fruit and a little less free liquid. Plan on:
- 1 to 1½ pounds washed cherry tomatoes per pint of whole packed tomatoes
- About 2 quarts fruit for 4 pints of Ball-style pickled grape or cherry tomatoes
- More fruit per finished pint of sauce, because cherry tomatoes are juicy and reduce as they cook
Use firm, ripe fruit with no soft spots, cracks that go into the flesh, or mold. Overripe tomatoes make thin, sour jars and raise the risk of spoilage.
Grape tomatoes are firmer and thicker-skinned than true cherries. They hold shape better in pickles, especially above 1,000 feet where water-bath times get longer.
Water bath or pressure canner
Both are approved for acidified tomatoes.
Water bath is enough when the recipe is a high-acid pickle or an acidified tomato product processed for the full published time. It is the usual choice for pickled cherry tomatoes (about 10 minutes at sea level) and for whole tomatoes packed in water (40 minutes for pints, 45 minutes for quarts at 0–1,000 feet).
Pressure canning shortens the heat for plain tomatoes — commonly 15 minutes at 5 pounds (weighted gauge, 0–1,000 feet) or the matching dial-gauge pressure for your elevation — and is required for any low-acid add-in that a tested recipe allows, such as certain vegetable-tomato mixtures. Acid still goes in the jar.
Packed in tomato juice, or packed raw with no added liquid, whole tomatoes need a much longer water-bath time (85 minutes at 0–1,000 feet). If you want a shorter boil, pack in water or use a pressure canner.
Recipe 1: Whole cherry tomatoes packed in water
This is the building-block jar. Open it in January, drain or keep the liquid, and treat the tomatoes like canned whole tomatoes: crush them into sauce, drop them into soup, or roast them in a pan with garlic after opening.
Official NCHFP directions for whole or halved tomatoes call for peeling. The dip-and-slip step was part of the tested process. Skins can affect heat movement and leave chewy bits in the jar. Cherry skins are thin, which is why many home recipes skip peeling, but that is a departure from the tested method. If you want the process that was actually tested, peel. If a tomato will not slip after a brief blanch, prick the skin and try again rather than leaving tough patches.
Acid, salt, and pack
For each pint: 1 tablespoon bottled lemon juice or 1/4 teaspoon citric acid, plus 1/2 teaspoon canning salt if you want it.
For each quart: 2 tablespoons bottled lemon juice or 1/2 teaspoon citric acid, plus 1 teaspoon salt if desired.
Headspace: 1/2 inch.
Raw pack is faster. Fill hot jars with prepared tomatoes, cover with boiling water, leave 1/2 inch headspace. Expect more float and some shrinkage after processing.
Hot pack gives fuller jars. Cover prepared tomatoes with water, boil gently 5 minutes, then pack hot tomatoes and cooking liquid to 1/2 inch headspace.
Remove bubbles, wipe rims, apply lids fingertip-tight.
Water-bath times for water-packed whole or halved tomatoes
| Jar | 0–1,000 ft | 1,001–3,000 ft | 3,001–6,000 ft | Above 6,000 ft |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pints | 40 min | 45 min | 50 min | 55 min |
| Quarts | 45 min | 50 min | 55 min | 60 min |
Those times are for both raw and hot pack.
Pressure-canner option (still acidify): 15 minutes at 5 lb weighted gauge at 0–1,000 feet, or 10 minutes at 15 lb; increase pressure, not time, above 1,000 feet per the NCHFP table for your gauge type.
After processing, rest jars 5 minutes in the canner, cool 12–24 hours, check seals, remove rings, and store in a dark place. Use sealed jars within a year for best quality.
Recipe 2: Pickled cherry tomatoes with garlic and rosemary
This is the recipe people actually snack from the jar. It is a Ball Blue Book pickle for grape tomatoes; cherry tomatoes of similar size are the usual substitute. The vinegar brine — not lemon juice in the tomato sense — is what makes the short process safe.
Yield: about 4 pints.
Ingredients
- 2 quarts cherry or grape tomatoes (small enough to pack without crushing)
- 1 teaspoon pickling or canning salt
- 1 cup white wine vinegar (5% acidity)
- 1 cup white vinegar (5% acidity)
- 1 quart water
- 4 garlic cloves, peeled
- 4 sprigs fresh rosemary
- Optional: 1/8 teaspoon pickle crisp per pint
Method
- Wash tomatoes. Leave them whole. A pinprick in two sides of each tomato reduces bursting.
- Combine salt, both vinegars, and water. Bring to a boil, then simmer 10 minutes.
- Pack tomatoes into hot pint jars to 1/2 inch headspace. Add 1 garlic clove and 1 rosemary sprig to each jar.
- Ladle hot brine over the tomatoes, still leaving 1/2 inch headspace. Remove bubbles.
- Process pints 10 minutes in a boiling-water or steam canner at 0–1,000 feet. Increase time for altitude (commonly 15 minutes from 1,001–6,000 feet and 20 minutes above that, following current Ball altitude charts).
Wait 2–3 weeks before opening so the brine moves into the fruit. Grape tomatoes stay firmer than cherries after the same process.
A dill version exists in the same family of Ball pickles: dill heads or fresh dill, shallot, mustard seed, and a vinegar brine, still processed 10 minutes at sea level. Do not cut the vinegar or lengthen the simmer into a “custom” low-vinegar mix.
Recipe 3: Crushed cherry tomatoes or a thin sauce
Cherry tomatoes make a sweet, loose crush because they carry more water and less paste-tomato solids than Romas. That is useful for soup and thin pasta sauce. It is a poor match if you want a thick pizza sauce unless you cook the juice down first.
Follow a tested crushed-tomato or tomato-sauce process, not a roasted-oil pan sauce.
Practical method that stays inside tested tomato rules
- Wash tomatoes. Peel if you are following the crushed-tomato procedure as published. A food mill after a brief cook removes skins and seeds in one pass and is the reason cherry tomatoes are pleasant to sauce.
- Cut or crush enough fruit to start juice in a wide pot so the mass does not scorch.
- Heat to a boil and simmer until the tomatoes soften. For a thinner “crushed” product, stop sooner. For a thin sauce, keep cooking until the volume drops and the texture coats a spoon. Cherry tomatoes can take longer to thicken than you expect.
- Run through a food mill if you want a smooth jar.
- Acidify each jar: same lemon juice or citric acid amounts as whole tomatoes.
- Fill hot, 1/2 inch headspace, and process using the crushed-tomato or tomato-sauce times from NCHFP or So Easy to Preserve for your jar size and elevation — not the 10-minute pickle time, and not an invented “sauce is already hot so 20 minutes is fine.”
Do not stir in extra olive oil, roasted garlic cloves packed in oil, dairy, or flour before canning. Season with dried herbs in amounts a tested sauce recipe allows, or season when you open the jar.
A roasted cherry tomato sauce can be canned only when it is built on a tested acidified tomato-sauce formula and the oil stays at the tiny amount that recipe specifies. Roasting improves flavor. It does not replace acid or processing time.
Recipe 4: Cherry tomato salsa from a tested formula
Garden salsa is where people get into trouble. Onions, peppers, and garlic are low-acid. A bowl of chopped Sungolds with a squeeze of lime is fine in the fridge. It is not a canning recipe.
Use a published salsa — Ball, NCHFP, or an extension bulletin — and substitute cherry tomatoes by weight for the tomatoes in that recipe. Do not reduce the bottled lime juice or vinegar. Do not increase the onion or pepper. Do not can salsa in quarts unless the recipe says you may; many tested salsas are pint-only.
Cherry tomatoes make a sweeter, sometimes wetter salsa. If the tested recipe starts with drained chopped tomatoes, drain the chopped cherries the same way so the jar is not mostly liquid.
Yellow cherry tomato salsa is safe when the acid and ratios stay the same. Taste will be milder and less “red tomato.”
If you want roasted flavor, roast and then follow the tested salsa measurements, or make a small roasted batch and refrigerate it.
What not to can, even though it tastes like summer
These show up constantly in search results and on social posts. They are refrigerator or freezer projects:
- Cherry tomatoes packed in olive oil with garlic
- Oven-roasted tomatoes with balsamic and oil, sealed “because vinegar is in there”
- Creamy tomato soup
- Unacidified “Italian grandmother” sauce processed for 35 minutes
- Any salsa whose vinegar or lime was cut “because the tomatoes are so acidic”
- Jars larger than the recipe allows
Balsamic is not a standardized 5% canning acid in the way white vinegar is. Do not treat a drizzle as a substitute for bottled lemon juice.
If you already love oil-roasted cherry tomatoes, freeze them flat on a tray, then bag them. Quality stays closer to fresh than a compromised canned jar ever will.
How to use the jars once they are on the shelf
Whole packed tomatoes: Drain for a tighter sauté, or keep the liquid in soups. They collapse when heated. That is normal. Use them anywhere you would use a can of whole tomatoes.
Pickled tomatoes: Serve cold. They belong next to cheese, on grain bowls, in tuna salad, and on toast with ricotta. The brine can stand in for a splash of vinegar in a vinaigrette.
Crushed tomatoes and thin sauce: Treat as you would canned crushed tomatoes. Reduce further in a skillet if you need body. Salt at the stove; the jar may already contain optional canning salt.
Salsa: Eat as salsa, or simmer it into a quick braise for beans or chicken. If a jar looks watery, drain slightly before serving with chips.
Always boil home-canned tomatoes and tomato sauces for 10 minutes before tasting if you have any reason to doubt the process, the seal, or the acid step. When a lid is unsealed, the contents are bulging, or the smell is off, discard the food where pets and people will not eat it.
Problems you will see in the first batch
Jars look half empty after cooling. Raw-pack cherry tomatoes shrink and float. Pack tighter next time without crushing, or switch to hot pack.
Skins split and the liquid looks cloudy. Common with whole cherries. Cloudiness from tomato pulp is normal. Cloudiness plus a bad smell, spurting liquid, or an unsealed lid is not.
Pickles went soft. Long process times at high altitude plus thin-skinned cherries will do that. Use grape tomatoes, prick skins, and do not add extra process “for luck.”
Sharp lemon taste in plain tomatoes. The acid did its job. A small amount of sugar in the pan when you cook from the jar balances it. Do not put less acid in the next batch.
Floating spices or tomatoes above the liquid. Remove bubbles more carefully and keep 1/2 inch headspace. Fruit above the liquid is a quality issue if the jar sealed and was processed correctly; keep those jars and use them first.
Frequently asked questions
Do I have to peel cherry tomatoes? For NCHFP whole, halved, and crushed tomato processes, the tested directions include peeling. Pickle recipes from Ball leave grape and cherry tomatoes whole and unpeeled. Match the recipe in front of you instead of mixing the two styles.
Can I leave them raw and skip the water bath if I add lots of vinegar? No. Vinegar in a tested pickle brine plus the published process time is the combination that was tested. A random strong brine with no process is a refrigerator pickle.
Can I can them in the oven or dishwasher? No. Those methods do not heat the contents the way a water-bath or pressure canner does.
How long do sealed jars last? Best quality is within 12–18 months in a cool, dark place. A sealed, properly processed jar can last longer, but flavor and texture fade.
Can I use pint-and-a-half or half-gallon jars? Only if the recipe lists that size. Tomato and salsa processes are written for specific jar sizes because heat has to reach the center.
Is it safer to pressure-can everything? Pressure canning is excellent for plain tomatoes and required for many mixtures. It does not let you skip acid in tomato products, and it does not make an oily roasted mix safe.
Cherry tomatoes earn their place in the canner when you pick a style first and then use the process that belongs to that style. A case of acidified whole pints plus a few jars of rosemary pickles will cover more winter meals than a single experimental sauce ever will.