Roasted Tomato Sauce

The tomato glut is in full force.  That means it is time to make tomato sauce, which is one of my favorite things from the garden.  I love roasted tomato sauce- it is delicious and it is very easy to make.  There is very little chopping or stirring, but you do need a food mill.

A batch of sauce makes about a pint and takes 4 pounds of tomatoes (I used a mix of Roma VF, Plum Regal, San Marzano and Amish Paste), a couple of sweet bell peppers, a small head of garlic, a few small onions, oregano and olive oil.

Everything gets roughly chopped except for the garlic, which is peeled and put in whole.  It all goes into a 9 x 13 inch pan.

Roast at 450°F for 1 1/2 to 2 hours, stirring every thirty minutes.  The tomatoes will get blackened and it will not look very pretty when it comes out of the oven.

Let it cool and run through a food mill.  I got my Victorio food strainer last year and it has been a wonderful addition to my kitchen and has made tomato season much easier and quicker to deal with.  The roasted ingredients go into the top, you push it into the mill, crank it and then it separates the thick sauce from the skins and seeds.

You end up with a delicious roasted tomato sauce that is thick and rich.  I have not canned this sauce because I'm not sure how acidic it is.  I'm a paranoid canner and only use recipes for canning that have been tested, so I freeze my tomato sauce in quart size bags.  There's nothing like the taste of roasted, homegrown tomatoes in the middle of winter.

Roasted Tomato Sauce

Ingredients

• 4 pounds tomatoes, stemmed and quartered 
• 1 large onion (or 2-3 small), roughly chopped
• 2 small bell peppers, roughly chopped
• 8 cloves fresh garlic
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 1 tablespoon dry oregano (or a handful of fresh oregano & basil)
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions

1. Combine ingredients in a 9x13 inch pan.
2. Roast at  for 1 1/2 to 2 hours, until juices get thick.  Stir every half hour.  Tomatoes will get a bit blackened.
3. Let cool, and run through a food mill to remove skins & seeds.  The resulting puree will be thick, so there is no need to reduce.
4. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Mr. Stripey Heirloom Tomato Caprese Salad

Nothing is more summery than a big, juicy tomato fresh off the vine.  The first tomato always brings excitement.  It is usually the small cherry tomatoes, which are delicious and juicy balls of sunshine that you pop into your mouth as soon as they are picked.  The anticipation of the first big tomato is a summer tradition.  While the evening soundtrack of cicadas, crickets and tree frogs plays in the background, I walk the tomato row looking for signs of ripening.  I had my eye on a big Mr. Stripey with anticipation.  It was a giant tomato and seemed to take forever to ripen.

Finally the moment came.  Time to harvest the first big tomato of the year:

Mr. Stripey Tomato: 1 lbs, 2 oz

This is my first year growing Mr. Stripey.  It is an heirloom variety that was discovered by Wayne Hilton in Georgia.  The reason I added him to my grow list, other than his cool stripes and giant size, is that it is an heirloom tomato that has been shown to have very good resistance to late blight.  With hot and humid summers in South Carolina, late blight always shows up in my garden.  Any disease resistance is a positive trait to have.  It is an indeterminate tomato that can grow very large, which I luckily have room for.  I just hope it doesn't get so tall that I can't reach the tomatoes!

What to do with this big, beautiful tomato?  I wanted to highlight it's loveliness and flavor, so I felt a Caprese salad would be perfect.

I assembled some simple ingredients: a big Mr. Stripey tomato, fresh mozzarella, garden fresh basil, olive oil, salt and pepper.

I sliced the tomato and the mozzarella into 1/4 inch slices.  Just look at that beautiful tomato!

Then I layered a tomato slice, a mozzarella slice and topped it with a basil leaf.  I kept making stacks and then drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with salt and pepper.

A beautiful and delicious way to enjoy the first big tomato of summer.  Mr. Stripey has a low acid content, which means that the sweetness comes out.  It is not a strong or tart tomato, so a simple dish highlights its flavor without drowning it out.

If you decide to grow Mr. Stripey, be sure to not overwater.  They are prone to cracking and have a better taste with less water.

Savor those fresh garden tomatoes... summer is fleeting!

Tomato Weaving

The garden has been pricey this year..a tiller attachment for the tractor (hooray for Craigslist and a used one!), the deer fence and I've lost count of how many bales of straw I've bought.  When it came to supports for my tomatoes I didn't want to spend a fortune.  My plan was to have twenty tomato plants.  Somehow I only started 18 from seed and then one had an unfortunate mishap with the garden hose, so I have 17 tomato plants.  Getting even the cheapest tomato cages was still going to be expensive, plus the frustration of them not working well.

As I contemplated how to hold up my tomatoes, they continued to grow and the beginnings of a tomato formed.  I needed to search for a effective and cheap method.  I thought about making my own cages out of cattle panels.  Here's a great tutorial for how to make these: sturdy tomato cages.  However, making 17 would be a lot of work and then I would have to store 17 cages that don't collapse.

Another option I considered was the Florida weave.  This method involves putting tall stakes in the ground after every two or three tomato plants and then weaving twine between the posts to hold up the tomatoes.  This website has nice illustrations: Florida weave.

I had a couple of fence posts remaining, so I would just need to buy rebar and twine.  I wanted to use rebar instead of wooden stakes because they will not rot or break.  This method was definitely my cheapest option.  I had one concern with the Florida weave technique.  My tomato plants are a mix of determinate and indeterminate varieties.  The indeterminate varieties grow much larger that the determinate ones.  I did not plan ahead and separate the two types in my row of tomatoes, so the variation in height may make it difficult.

J and I took Domino for a walk and I explained my tomato support dilemma (which I'm sure he was completely enthralled by).  He was probably thinking which method was going to be the least amount of work for him!  The cow people (what we call the family that rents the farm at the end of the road for their cows) drove up and coincidentally asked us if we needed some rebar.  Why yes!  He works in construction and had a bunch leftover from a job.  That was how I decided to go with the Florida weave method for my tomatoes!

After our flash flood last week the garden was a soggy mess, which was a perfect time to drive the fence posts and rebar into the ground.  I have to say we did a horrible job making a straight row, so I think I have to call my technique the crooked Florida weave.

Instead of twine, J thought I should use wire because we had a bunch leftover from the fence building.  I have to say that weaving with a heavy spool of wire was not fun.  I may buy twine for future weaving.

Also I'm a bit concerned that if it gets really windy, the tomatoes could get cut by the wire.  The good thing about the wire is that since it is sturdy, I don't have to pull it really tight around the tomatoes.  So far it seems to be working, but of course the tomato plants are not very big yet.  I'll let you know how it is holding up by August.

This post is shared at Green Thumb Thursday at Grow a Good Life.

Babies Waiting for Spring

Seedlings have been growing in the potting shed for the last month and I don't know if it is just me transferring my feelings, but they seem to be impatiently waiting for spring.  The tomatoes, eggplant, and pepper have to wait until mid April for their garden debut. 

I fell for a new tomato hybrid this year.  I usually stick with heirloom varieties such as Cherokee Purple, Amish Paste, San Marzano, Brandywine, and Yellow Pear.  This year my tomato goal is to harvest enough paste tomatoes to make sauce to can.  When I saw Burpee's new Super Sauce Tomato, I couldn't resist trying.  I've never paid $6.50 for 25 seeds before, so these tomatoes better be amazing!  
 

Also growing in the potting shed are some broccoli seedlings.  I will be hardening them off this week!

I can't wait for a growing garden and yummy harvests.  I was a bit (ok, a lot) neglectful of my winter garden, so not much survived to provide fresh produce in the early spring.  However, the bees seem to appreciate my neglect.  I planted pac choi in the fall and never got around to harvesting it.  It is now flowering and the bees are flocking to it.

I'm glad someone can benefit from my gardening neglect!