Thanks, Anhata, witchiepoo, and Lynn for your advice. My sauce is definitely quite acidic - it includes substantial quantities of tomatoes, in addition to balsamic vinegar and other low-pH ingredients (doesn't it seem appetizing when it's phrased that way? ).

I'm still not entirely sure whether I'm going to do it this year. My mother, for one, thinks I'd be crazy to send out my first attempts at canning as gifts, since I would prefer to avoid giving my friends and family food poisoning.

Who knows, maybe I can get DGF to snag a couple of petri dishes and some agar from work and I could just do cultures to ensure sterility.

Assuming, however, that I end up doing this, here's what I'm thinking of including:

One or two jars of my assorted sauces, one block of parmigiano reggiano cheese, and a pack of spaghettoni or fusilli.