Foley Food Mill

A foley food mill (except we called it a foley feed mill) was necessary equipment in my mother's kitchen. In fact, when I see this thing, I can smell the tomatoes boiling. It was used exclusively to make tomato juice for canning.The handle is turned and the tomatoes are pressed through the holes in the bottom, leaving behind the skins and seed. While this instrument makes me nostalgic, it is not a happy nostalgia. I hate the smell of boiling tomatoes, don't like tomato juice, and am happy that I do not have to can tomatoes any more. But, I do know how. My mother could jump on a bucket of tomatoes and have the juice canned in no time. It was the all day canning that I objected to, and smelling that stuff all day. We usually canned 50 to 100 quarts every summer. They were used for soup and stew but daddy liked to drink the juice. :(
I recently found a new (to me) use for the foley mill. It makes wonderful cracker or vanilla wafer crumbs. I believe people use it mainly now in baby food preparation.