07 October 2008

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes

photo of a cat sneering at us and talking about grammerI am currently in the process of making a HUGE mess in our kitchen. The reason...tomatoes. Yes, we have gotten our yearly flood of the round, red things and I am trying to figure out what to do with them all. To date, I have made two batches of salsa, each containing around 60 tomatoes, and we have given away bags of the things. So, what to do with the current crop?

My wife and I sat down and tried to come up with a plan. I suggested that we can the
remaining 100 or so, but she had a better idea: why not make a soup? So, with this plan in hand, I am currently making a Roasted Tomato and Garlic Soup. My plan is to make a huge batch of the stuff and then store it in the freezer for later consumption. (A fancy way of saying we will eat the stuff...preferably with a grilled cheese sandwich).

Now, I am roasting, in batches, the tomatoes, garlic, onions, and carrots in the oven. This process alone has taken over 4 hours. It takes about 40-45 minutes per batch at 4250. As the veggies and tomatoes come out of the oven, I place them in a large stock pot, to which I have added tomato paste, bay leaves (Turkish), salt, pepper, and Italian Seasoning. I wanted to add basil, but naturally I don't have any.

I have set the pots to boil and, after simmering for 1 hour, they are now cooling down. During this process, I re-seasoned it with a bit more of everything and also added some brown sugar and granulated sugar. I must say that the flavor is spot-on. Once cooled, I will process the soup in a blender and run it through a food mill. From there it will be into jars and a quick trip to the freezer.

After 9 hours, I have finally finished. I got a little over 10 quarts of Tomato soup. When I heat-up a serving, I like to add a touch of cream to the soup; it makes it taste much richer (and you wonder why I'm on a diet). Now, for the grilled cheese.

10 comments:

  1. Why not make spaghetti sauce, soup, dice tomatoes etc and just can it all for use over the winter months?

    Preserve those beauties they'll get you through the winter and save money!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Talina: Since we have more ripening as I speak, our next batch will be spaghetti sauce and then lastly, I will can any remainders. For some reason, this season we have had a bumper-crop of tomatoes.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Elaine here: Oh yum - this sounds delicious! I so love tomatoes!

    ReplyDelete
  4. It may be a lot of work right now, but it sounds delicious and just think how good it will taste to have hot soup on a cold winter's day.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Lux: Me too, and I'm glad that the soup turned out good:)

    Broadway Matron: Sure, you supply the grilled cheese and I'll supply the soup:)

    wildcatsthree: I totally agree. It was a great deal of work, but it is well worth the effort:-)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Da Old Man: Spaghetti sauce is next-up. We have about 40-50 more tomatoes that are coming due in the next few days. Currently I have no recipes, do you have any favorite recipes??

    ReplyDelete
  7. I love, love, love tomatoes! Hubby is the salsa king in our family but he's never used 60 tomatoes for it!

    ReplyDelete
  8. BeadedTail: We had a bumper crop of tomatoes this year and the first batch is always salsa. We like it mild to medium and put it on just about everything:)

    ReplyDelete
  9. Oh please can I have some? Please?

    Edited to remove dead link. Comment originally published on...

    08 October, 2008 09:28

    ReplyDelete

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...

Google Analytics