Best Tomato Strainer in Canada 2026 (Sauce, Passata)
The best tomato strainer for most Canadian home canners is the Weston food strainer and sauce maker, a crank-operated machine at 85 to 110 Canadian dollars — you cook the tomatoes soft, feed them into the hopper, and pulp comes out one spout while skins and seeds eject the other, with no peeling or seeding. For high-volume canning of 50-plus pounds a year, an electric tomato strainer machine (900 to 1,150 dollars) does the same job faster. A food mill costs about the same, so the choice is throughput and counter space rather than price: below about 10 pounds a batch, a mill is enough.
If you can a case of tomatoes a year, the slowest, most tedious part isn’t the canning — it’s the peeling and seeding. A tomato strainer (also sold as a sauce maker or passata machine) removes that step entirely: you cook the tomatoes soft, feed them into a hopper, and a screw auger pushes smooth pulp out one spout while the skins and seeds eject out the other. No blanching to slip skins, no scooping seeds.
This is the step up from a food mill — worth it once you’re processing more than about 10–15 lb of tomatoes at a sitting.
As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Some links on this site are affiliate links — they cost you nothing extra and help keep the site free. We do not test products; we report what Bernardin and Canadian health authorities publish. Affiliate disclosure.
Weston Food Strainer and Sauce Maker — the manual pick for most people
About $85–110 CAD, on Amazon.ca and at Canadian kitchen shops.
The crank-operated strainer that most Canadian home canners land on. It mounts to the counter — a suction base, or a C-clamp if your counter has a lip — you turn the handle, and cooked tomatoes go in the top while pulp and waste come out two separate spouts. No peeling, no seeding, continuous feed.
Crank-driven, 1 gallon hopper, dual-mount suction base and C-clamp. Ships with a 1.5 mm stainless screen; more screens come as accessory kit 07-0858, sold separately. $85–110 CAD.
Prices are approximate Canadian retail and change without notice — check the current price before you buy.
As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Some links on this site are affiliate links — they cost you nothing extra and help keep the site free. We do not test products; we report what Bernardin and Canadian health authorities publish.
Check price on Amazon.ca →What’s good:
- No peeling or seeding — the entire reason to own one
- Continuous feed — keep dropping tomatoes in; a case processes in 20–30 minutes
- Splash guard and chute — the guard keeps the mess off your hands, the chute puts the purée straight into the bowl
- Dual mount — a suction base for a smooth counter, a C-clamp for everything else; you crank with one hand and feed with the other
- Interchangeable screens — one 1.5 mm stainless screen is included; more come as Weston’s accessory kit 07-0858, sold separately
- Hand-powered — nothing to plug in, nothing to burn out
Trade-offs:
- Plastic body — the body and hopper are plastic, though the screen itself is stainless; treat it gently and it lasts years, but it’s not a lifetime cast-metal tool
- Manual effort — a big batch is a workout; fine for a case or two, tiring past that
- Mount, not bolt — the suction base needs a smooth clean counter to hold well, and the C-clamp needs an edge it can reach around; one of the two will usually work
Best for: households canning 1–3 cases of tomatoes a year, plus anyone who wants seedless raspberry or blackberry jam without the mesh-straining chore.
Electric tomato strainer machines — the high-volume option
About $900–1,150 CAD, at specialty and restaurant-supply retailers.
If a manual crank is the bottleneck — you’re putting up 50+ lb of tomatoes, or making sauce for an extended family — an electric tomato strainer machine does the same job with a motor instead of your arm. They’re a serious purchase (roughly $1,000), overkill for most households, and worth it only at real volume. Search “electric tomato strainer machine” on Amazon.ca to compare current models; the mechanism is identical to the manual unit, just powered.
Squeezo — the premium specialty strainer
The legendary heavy-duty crank strainer (stainless drum, lifetime parts) that serious preservers inherit. It’s a specialty item ordered from Lehman’s or canning specialists rather than Amazon.ca, starting from roughly $200. If you want a buy-it-for-life manual strainer and don’t mind sourcing it from a specialty retailer, it’s the one. That is the honest split in this category: the Weston above is the one you can buy this week, and the Squeezo is the one you inherit.
Do you actually need a strainer?
Below about 10 lb per batch, you don’t — a food mill (or even a sieve and some patience) is cheaper and stores smaller. The strainer earns its counter space when you’re canning tomatoes by the case: whole-tomato sauce, crushed tomatoes, passata/tomato sauce, and salsa all get dramatically faster. Whatever you strain, cook the pulp down and process it following your Bernardin recipe and altitude.
Altitude adjustment
Process times in a boiling-water canner are written for altitudes up to 305 m. Above that, water boils below 100 °C and the time printed in the recipe is no longer enough. Find your elevation, then add the minutes Bernardin publishes for that band.
| Elevation (m) | Elevation (ft) | Add to processing time |
|---|---|---|
| 0 – 305 | 0 – 1,000 | None — use the recipe time as written |
| 306 – 915 | 1,001 – 3,000 | +5 minutes |
| 916 – 1,830 | 3,001 – 6,000 | +10 minutes |
| 1,831 – 2,440 | 6,001 – 8,000 | +15 minutes |
| 2,441 – 3,050 | 8,000 – 10,000 | +20 minutes |
On the line between two bands, round up to the higher one. Slightly over-processing is safe; under-processing is not.
Bernardin’s published tables stop at 3,050 m.
Find your Canadian city · Full altitude guide
Figures from Bernardin, “How do I can at a high altitude?” (bernardin.ca). Confirm against your own Bernardin edition before you start — a book edition and the website can differ.
Frequently asked questions
What's the difference between a tomato strainer and a food mill?
A food mill is a bowl with a hand-cranked blade that presses cooked food through a disc — you work in batches, and you refill it constantly. A tomato strainer (also called a sauce maker or passata machine) is continuous-feed: a screw auger pushes the pulp through a screen while skins and seeds eject out a separate spout, so you just keep feeding tomatoes in. For a few jars a food mill is fine; for a case of tomatoes a strainer is 5–10× faster.
Do I need to peel or seed the tomatoes first?
No — that's the whole point of a strainer. Core the tomatoes, quarter them, and cook them soft (10–15 minutes), then run them through. The skins and seeds separate automatically. Some people don't even core first for a very smooth sauce; the strainer handles it. You still cook the strained pulp down and can it following your Bernardin recipe and altitude.
Manual crank or electric?
Manual crank (the Weston food strainer and sauce maker) is right for most households — it mounts to the counter with either a suction base or a C-clamp, costs $85–110 CAD, and handles a case or two of tomatoes a season without complaint. Electric tomato strainer machines run about $1,000 and only pay off if you put up 50+ pounds of tomatoes a year, or make sauce for an extended family. Start manual; upgrade only if the crank becomes the bottleneck.
Can I strain berries or pumpkin with it too?
Yes, with the right screen. Crank strainers take interchangeable screens, and the screen is what decides how fine the purée is. The Weston ships with one 1.5 mm stainless screen, which the manufacturer describes as a multipurpose screen for tomatoes and apples; additional screens come as Weston's 4-piece accessory kit 07-0858, sold separately. We are not listing what sizes that kit contains, because the listing does not say.
Sources
- Bernardin Home Canning — Tomato Sauce (https://www.bernardin.ca/recipes/en/tomato-sauce.htm)
- Bernardin Home Canning — Crushed Tomatoes (https://www.bernardin.ca/recipes/en/crushed-tomatoes.htm)
- Bernardin Home Canning — Home canning FAQ (https://www.bernardin.ca/en/how-to-can/faq.htm)