Tomates a la Provencale, Redux!

You can never have too much of something as good as Tomates a la Provencale! Please revisit my recipe and make some - and remember - it's better to do it under the broiler but I don't have one so I bake. You can crisp up your garlic & breadcrumbs much better in the broiler. Yums!

Green Zebra Tomato Jam

I got this idea from a recipe for Tomato Jam on paninis from a Portland newspaper - and sort of ran with it. You may not have Green Zebras on hand - but the fresh, ripe mellow flavor of green heirloom tomatoes is really good in this recipe.

• 2# of peeled, seeded & coarsely chopped tomatoes (drained - reserve the juice for bloody marys, for the love of mike!)
  
• 1 c. sugar
• 2 tsp fresh chopped thyme
• 1 tsp freshly ground white pepper
• 4 Tb sherry vinegar

Simmer til slightly thick - you still want to have some nice chunks of tomato - add a bit more sugar if it's not thickening up enough. It shouldn't be jammy sticky and thick - this is for savory sandwiches. Turns out this works really great on fried green tomato poboys.

YIELD:

8 - 4 oz jars

57# of San Marzano Tomatoes

My friend Jeff visited on Saturday and took 10# of the San Marzanos, leaving me with 57# which I cooked in one big and one smaller batch.

I put everything into the giant colander over a big steel bowl and then ran that juice through the chinois (to capture the seeds), then smashed all the pulp and seeds out in the chinois.

Next step was to process through the Kitchen Aid fruit strainer/puree attachment which is not quite robust enough for a lot of tomatoes - I had to stop every 5-10 minutes to take it apart, unclog it and put it back together. Next time - I will get a big tomato press/strainer!

YIELD:

• 11 quarts San Marzano tomato sauce
• 7 pints San Marzano tomato sauce
• 3/4 of 1 quart jar (for dinner tonight!)
• 2 quarts San Marzano raw tomato juice (to be frozen for soup broth)
  

Tomatoes, Figs & Peppers, oh my!

Perhaps I overcompensated but... the tomatoes were so friendly at Mariquita's U-Pick day, and their skins so warm and compelling to my touch... I ended up bringing home 67# of San Marzanos, and 60# of mixed heirlooms, Early Girl, Beefsteak and Green Zebra tomatoes. Along with 2# of pimientos de padron (including a big bag that Julia warned were "too hot" to sell because most of her customers fail to appreciate the charm of super spicy pimientos de padron), several pounds of red and yellow bell peppers, 20 (more) bunches of basil (because I just can't get enough pesto!),

I still have to put up the figs and am looking over fig chutney recipes to occupy my afternoon while the tomatoes cook down... some ideas are fig & tomato chutney, fig chutney with Meyer lemon zest & (canned) pineapple, fig & red pepper chutney, and fig & persimmon chutney. I'm also going to try my hand at tomato jelly this week, as well as defrosting the apricots to make up some apricot chutney.

Heirloom Tomatoes - U-pick - 50 cents/pound!

Tomato Upick 2009: Mariquita has a great event this Saturday - which, alas, I will not be able to enjoy since I will be otherwise engaged. If you want to get down to Hollister, you can pick tomatoes for 50 cents/pound, bring your own boxes.

A sad tale of two tomato gardens...

My tomatoes are not looking nearly as good as last year - next year, I am definitely mixing in several bags of manure and more fresh dirt. I threw in the towel and ordered a 20# box of San Marzano tomatoes from Mariquita and brought them home on the back of my motorcycle on Thursday night. I think that Andy, who writes a great blog Ladybug Letter, hasn't been exposed much to folks who use motorcycle for anything other than joy riding because he remarked, "You'll sure make an interesting figure in traffic with all that stuff on the motorcycle!"

Sunday, I seeded all the tomatoes and heated them up enough to put them through the Kitchen Aid food mill attachment. I quickly discovered that the skins clog up the food mill attachment quite quickly and ended up putting through the solid matter 3-4 times before I got all of the good stuff out of the skins - resulting in about 1# of skins and seeds going to compost out of 20# total. After simmering down the sauce in two pots (I really do need one big stockpot) - I put up my tomato sauce.

YIELD:
9 - 16 oz jars of San Marzano tomato sauce
9 - 8 oz jars of San Marzano tomato sauce

Tomates a la Provencale

Tomates a la Provencale turned out so well on Saturday that I think I am about to experience a slight addiction similar to the bruschetta addiction that ran from 2000-2002. Except, less bread, more tomatoes. This preparation is something I have done in the past - but for some reason, it went into a black hole in my brain and most of my tomatoes this season have been eaten raw or made into sauces.

No longer - I am going to be binging on garlic, fresh herbs and tomatoes from my garden, all baked up with a spritz of olive oil and panko until the juices are bubbly and the bread crumbs are crispy. Game on!

I swear - pictures are coming - I totally failed to take pictures of all the delicious food on Saturday and have not managed to actually get pictures of any of my roasted tomatoes in the last three days. Mmmm... tomatoes.

RECIPE:

1. Desired quantity of fresh tomatoes halved across the middle (if large) or stem end sliced (if small or mushy). You can use ripe tomatoes or tomatoes that are semi-ripe or green.
2. Place tomatoes into a baking dish or bread pan -- something with sides.
   
3. Mound tomatoes with fresh (more) or dried herbs (less) - my favorites are thyme and oregano, though I mix it up a bit and add lavender, rosemary or basil.
4. Mound each tomato half with pressed garlic - as much as you have in the fridge or desire. Mound it, baby. Don't skimp!
5. Sprinkle the top of the tomatoes with panko or fine bread crumbs (you can make it with stale bread ends or toast the bread in the oven while it preheats).
6. Sprinkle with coarsely ground black pepper and coarse Celtic sea salt.
7. Drizzle with olive oil.
8. Drizzle with olive oil.
9. Drizzle with ... oh. Nevermind. Just make sure it's really good olive oil.
10. Bake in oven at 350-400 F depending on how much your oven wildly fluctuates until there are bubbling hot juices in the bottom of the pan but before the tomatoes are completely falling apart. You want to have something yummy to sop up with a piece of bread but you also want to be able to eat the tomato with a fork.

Don't forget the garlic. Lots of it. Yum.

Tomatoes!

It's all about tomatoes this week. Friday, I cleaned the tomato seeds that I had been fermenting since Sunday and put them in the Excalibur on the lowest setting to dry them up.

Both James & I picked as many ripe tomatoes as we could from our gardens at the end of the week. I even pulled up four tomato plants that were done (three were volunteer cherries).

Saturday, I spent the day doing housework and cleaning. I even had a pair of housekeepers come in to help out while I labeled, inventoried and organized all my jars of preserves and boxes of wine from Dry Creek & Anderson Valley.

Saturday night, James and I set 9 trays of tomatoes to dry in the Excalibur. For those of you who dehydrate, that results in about 3 half pint jars of dried cherry tomatoes (ha!). We dried some bigger tomatoes but I need to cut those into strips and dry them a bit more. We also got started with the yellow tomato sauce and then put it away to finish on Sunday.

Today, we dilly-dallied a bit, had chai & backgammon, went to his house, then to brunch and on errands. We had a nap and then finally started on making the tomato sauce around 6pm. James worked his buns off with me for 4 hours. I have been waiting for the sauce to cook down and processing the jars for the last two hours. Here's the result:

YIELD:

Dried tomatoes:
3 - 8 oz jars of dried cherry tomatoes from Jenn's garden

Yellow tomato sauce:
2 - 16 oz jars (both gardens, more Jenn's due to Wonderlights)

Orange tomato sauce:
9 - 12 oz jars (both gardens, mostly James due to enormous Hawaiian Pineapples)

Red tomato sauce:
12 - 16 oz jars (both gardens)

This probably isn't the last batch of sauce for us. There are still a lot of tomatoes on both our plants. I cut down dead parts and removed branches from a few plants that had no more fruit or flowers -- I need to do that again on Tuesday or Wednesday this week to help the plants mature the rest of the fruit.

I do want to make more dried tomatoes, too. We both have a lot of basil that is about to flower, so we need to make up more batches of pesto. I think I may just make oregano-thyme-basil-garlic-oil pesto to freeze -- no pine nuts -- so that I can use it to season my tomato sauce when I open it this winter.

FIGS: Asiya from Forage Oakland brought me a couple dozen figs - so I am going to make another small batch of fig preserves.

RHUBARB & RASPBERRIES: Probably the last of the season. I bought these at the Ferry Plaza Farmer's Market on Tuesday and intended to make a big crisp but was totally off track. I may just freeze up the raspberries on a cookie sheet and make rhubarb pie or crisp later this week.

Tomatoes, figs, dried fruit, and bake sale prep

DRIED TOMATOES: Friday, I received my 9-tray Excalibur dehydrator - a bargain at $149 for a refurbished demo model (not a refurbished customer model) with shipping included. It looks brand new -- it has no "blemishes" on the case as described in the Ebay ad and if I didn't know any better, I'd say it was new.

Saturday, I put it to work right away on some Principe Borghese tomatoes - they are smaller than some of my cherry tomatoes.

YIELD:
1 - 16 oz jar dried tomatoes
1 - 8 oz jar dried tomatoes

YELLOW KETCHUP: Sunday, I put a couple pots of tomatoes on -- one full of 5# of yellow and orange tomatoes for ketchup and another of around 6# for marinara sauce. For the ketchup, I found a lot of recipes and even one ketchup recipe on a site that lets you customize the yield and adjusts the quantities of ingredients.

TOMATO KETCHUP RECIPE:

• 5# seeded and halved tomatoes - cook down and process in food mill to remove skins, return to pot.

Add:

• 1/2 large onion, pureed in blender or food processor
• 5 cloves garlic, pressed

In a small sauce pot, simmer:

• 2 c apple cider vinegar
• 1/2 stick Ceylon cinnamon
• 1.5 Tbs cloves
• 1 Tsp fenugreek seed
• Pinch chili flakes
• 1/2 tsp coriander seed

Reduce the vinegar by 50% over low flame (you don't want to boil it off too quickly!)

Strain and add vinegar to pot with tomato sauce, onion and garlic. Cook down and then put in a slow cooker on low until it reaches a consistency you like. Puree in blender to reduce the rest of onion & garlc pieces. Can or store in refrigerator.

YIELD:
4 c orange ketchup


TOMATO SAUCE: Six pounds of tomatoes cooks down to just enough sauce for two plates of fresh rotini pasta, and leftovers for four lunches, after you've added herbs and vegetables.

GARDEN MARINARA RECIPE: 6# fresh tomatoes, seeded & halved - cook down and process in food mill to remove skins, return to pot.

Sautee in olive oil until soft:

• 1/2 large white onion, coarsely chopped
• 1 red bell pepper, coarsely chopped

Add to sauce bring to simmer:

• 4-5 2" basil plant tops, chiffonade & chopped
• 4-5 2" oregano sprigs, chopped

10 4" zucchini (or courgettes) cut into 1/2" rounds, sauteed until soft - add to sauce right before serving.

YIELD: about 10 cups sauce with vegetables
2 dinners over fresh rotini pasta with bread
4 lunch portions of pasta sauce


FIG PRESERVES: James' mom brought us some delicious figs from her neighobor's garden in Sacramento. "I brought you four dozen figs!" she exclaimed. We we curious to know why the figure was so exact and then impressed with her genius -- to keep the very ripe figs from crushing under their weight, she put them into egg cartons!

I brought home 2 dozen figs and decided to turn them into jam.

RECIPE:
24 ripe figs, halved and mashed
1.5 c sugar
1/4 c lemon juice

Simmer figs in 1-2 cups of water until soft and mash. Measure - you should have about 4 cups of figs & water. Add the lemon juice and follow the pectin instructions -- in my case, 3 tsp of calcium water, and 4 tsp of pectin added to the sugar before mixing it into the preserves.

YIELD:
2 12 oz recycled jars, stored in the fridge (one for me, one for James)

DEHYDRATING: The new Excalibur works great! I dried tomatoes. Lots of tomatoes. The Principe Borghese tomatoes from Saturday came out on Sunday and are about the size of dried cherries. I also dried some of the other cherry tomatoes -- the volunteer cherries came out about the same as the Principe Borghese, while the Black Cherry, Blondkopfchen and Aunt Ruby's Yellow Cherry tomatoes were a bit smaller.

I also put in the rest of the Asian pears I had been saving in the refrigerator, along with a whole cantalope sliced up, and the rest of the red flesh apples and a few other apples I had been saving.

YIELD:
1 1.5 liter baling wire jar of thin dried fruit slices (I'll try to photograph before I eat them all)


(UN)BAKING: Last but not least - I also put together a double batch of lemon bars from the "Joy of Vegan Baking" cookbook, and started the Cafe Gratitude raw coconut cream pie recipe (but ran out of time and energy).


BIG THANKS to Lisa for coming over and helping to halve and seed tomatoes for the dehydrator, mill tomatoes, clean dishes and keep me company - we had a lot of fun for a few hours and it was really good to have some help. She also loaned her slow cooker so I could put the ketchup in it overnight.

Paste Tomato Sauce-Off

This weekend I scored some killer tomatoes from an organic garden at a lovely private campground in Willits. These babies were huge -- like 7" long, looking more like big red peppers than tomatoes. The gardener said they were Romas -- and that all the big tomatoes had been picked and made into sauce already. I brought home about 10 of them and tonight I made a small batch of sauce (saving the seeds, of course) with these Romas, and a small batch of sauce with some of my Debarao tomatoes.

The Romas had a very sweet flavor before I even cooked them -- it's a lot hotter up there in Willits! The Debarao tomatoes had a very solid flesh and less juice than the Romas, and a very tomato-y taste. Both are good and after packing four small jars, I ate the rest of the sauce on warm bread.

YIELD:
2 - 8 oz jars Roma tomato sauce
2 - 8 oz jars Debarao tomato sauce

The Hawaiian pineapple and Yellow Ruffled are starting to come in, as are the Amana Orange. I think I am going to make some yellow and orange pasta sauce out of those babies, too. The Italian Tree tomatoes are starting to get really ripe, and may make a nice little batch of sauce as well.

I'm looking at buying an Excalibur dehydrator - we haven't had enough heat or sun for my solar dehydrator to work very well. I'm pretty disappointed in the lack of weather cooperation at tomato harvest time here.

Pottsfield Relish

Pottsfield Relish, September 2007

After breakfast, James and I made up a big batch of Pottsfield Relish. This is from my grandmother's recipe -- it's a sweet tomato, onion and pepper relish. I actually found other versions online (varies as Pottsfield and Pottsville) which include cabbage, but the basic recipe is: tomatoes, onions, green peppers, a bit of vinegar and sugar. That's it.

RECIPE: POTTSFIELD RELISH
6 large tomatoes - peel, cook and strain
4 large onions, chopped
1 large green pepper, chopped

Add 1 c. sugar
1/2 c. vinegar
1 t. salt

Cook on stove 40-45 minutes or until thick. Ladle into jars and hot water bath process 10 minutes.

USE: This stuff is great to add to recipes, on top of potatoes, on top of mac-n-cheese and all sorts of things. My grandmother always put it on top of meatloaf and pot roast while they baked in the oven. As kids, we relished chilled Pottsfield relish on top of a bubbly open face cheese sandwich.

NOTES: After going out on my own, I continued to make Pottsfield Relish and applesauce every year -- even if I didn't have the time or resources to make other preserves. These two things are staples in my kitchen.

However, I've always double, triple or quadrupled the recipe, spending hours over the sink with a pile of large plum tomatoes, scalding them, seeding them, cooking them down. I always reserve the juice from the seeds to strain and reserve with the juice I pour off the tomatoes before adding the onions and peppers -- it makes a great soup base.

This year's batch, turned out a bit different -- it was a lot more watery and the tomatoes really cooked down lot.

I realize now, after looking at the results, the recipe and last year's photo that I did a few things differently. First, this batch of relish came out much like my grandmother's relish in her later years, after they moved to a retirement community. What I did differently this time:

• I used Heirloom tomatoes - not just plum tomatoes - and they cooked down a lot more
• I seeded the tomatoes, but didn't cook them down before adding the peppers and onions.
• I didn't peel the tomatoes (they were really ripe and I thought they would just dissolve).
  

It's been years since I have used tomatoes that weren't plum tomatoes for this -- now I remember why! Plum tomatoes have stronger meat and hold their own in cooking a lot better. The result tastes great, but looks a bit different from last year's relish (I've got the last quart in the fridge having opened it only two weeks ago when tomatoes appeared imminent).

Still yummy, though.

YIELD:
13 - 12 oz jars Pottsfield relish
1 - 12 oz jar tomato juice
1 - ice cube tray of tomato juice

Black Cherry Tomatoes

Dried Tomatoes!

The Principe Borgheses turn into little tomato raisins - pretty, and tasty. I don't like this dehydrator because it dries things unevenly. Some tomatoes looked burned on the edges, others got a bit moldy and didn't look like they were drying at all.

James borrowed a 5-tray Excalibur dryer from his friends for Asian pears and the results are amazing: dry, soft and chewable, super sweet Asian pear slices. It's still too foggy and cold to consider using the solar dehydrator. Beginning to think that it is a Bad Idea.

Cherry Tomatoes

Here's a pile of cherry tomatoes from the garden -- all varieties are represented here, including the volunteer cherry tomatoes (they are the biggest round tomatoes).

DRYING UPDATE: the Principe Borghese tomatoes are doing alright, but drying unevenly. The pears are crispy. They are brown. Not pretty.

Asian Pears, Tomatoes & not so hot solar dehydrating action

BREAKFAST at James included some of the most gorgeous heirloom tomatoes out of my garden, including one ripe Aunt Ruby's German Green

Clockwise, from 6:00: Green Zebra, Moskovich Extra Early, Brandywine, Moskovich, Aunt Ruby's German Green

TOMATO REPORT: SO far, we have tasted quite a lot of the tomatoes that we have planted. Here are some notes:

• Principe Borghese: this tomato is listed as a great drying tomato - they are a lot smaller than I expected, even smaller than the volunteer cherry tomatoes! They are firm and meaty with few seeds. Pretty tasty but not overly sweet, fresh.
• Moscovich Extra Early: I expected these to happen in June or July, but two months of fog doesn't encourage me to do much, either. These are a great dark red, tender and very sweet.
• Yellow Ruffled: very mild flavor, not exciting. We have only had a couple of these so far, so the jury is still out.
• Amana Orange: these are really pretty tomatoes -- the size has varied, but most of them aren't yet ripe. They are tasty but I haven't decided if I want to grow them again next year, yet.
• Deberao: a nice red paste tomato - this has the most outstanding flavor of any plum tomato I have ever bought. I plan to grow a lot more of these next year for canning.
• Aunt Ruby's German Green: outstanding flavor, juicy, meaty and we can't wait for more to ripen! I will definitely grow these next year.
• Paul Robeson: Very large, gorgeous and very delicious tomatoes. Definitely growing these next year.
• Brandywine: A late season tomato which can't seem to wait for the earlies and mids to finish up! These are pretty tasty, I can see why they are a favorite and I'll definitely grow more next year.
• Green Zebra: these are really good, but they have to be really ripe when you eat them or they don't have much flavor. I'll have one of these plants next year, for sure.
• Italian Tree: the plant near the fence with more space got about 12' high, but the other plants were more closely planted and didn't get nearly as high. These are really big tomatoes, as big as the Paul Robesons and have a great flavor. Most still aren't ripe, so we'll have more feedback on these later.
• Aker's West Virginia: a few of these ripened and they are great!
• Black Cherry: the most amazing cherry tomato ever. Definitely growing next year.
• Peacevine Cherry: small and delicious, I can't believe I only put in one plant!
• Super Snow White: large white-yellow cherry tomatoes, tart and citrusy. I like them but not sure about growing them again next year.
• Blondkopfchen: tiny yellow-gold cherry tomatoes, these are really good when they are really ripe. I'll definitely have one of these plants next year.
• Aunt Ruby's Yellow Cherry: tasty but not exciting. I need a couple of hot days to really decide on this one.
• Late Tomatoes: still waiting on Hawaiian Pineapple and Wonderlight. The Wonderlight plants barely germinated, I have two small, stunted plants that have about four large plum tomatoes that aren't ripe yet.

Notes: The tomatoes in pots did not do as well as the plants in the ground. I'm seriously considering doing raised beds next year as I think this will resolve drainage and spacing issues. "French Intensive" is a method of raised bed gardening that allows planting things more closely together. It should also help keep the slugs out of my garden.

PEAR PRESERVATION: James and I juiced up a pile of Asian pears -- it made fantastic juice, though I did notice that leaving the skins on gave the juice a bit of a fermented taste and the juice darkened up a lot more.

MORE FORAGING: After breakfast, we headed over to his friend's house to pick more Asian pears and Meyer lemons, then we went over to Larissa's to pick her quince tree.

DRYING: Around 11:30, the sun started to come out so we put the pears back in the solar dehydrator. Then, the fog rolled back in. Fog is not good for using a solar dehydrator.

Tomatoes, Zucchini & Lemons

Today I took the day off to get ready for a weekend at Orr Hot Springs, I took the day off to prep some food for us to bring to eat over the weekend. Last night, I checked the tomatoes -- some were really close so I decided to leave them on the vine for at least a few more hours of hot weather (Thursday was hot and Friday promises to be warm as well).

Well, this morning when I went out to the garden, I discovered that someone else beat me to one of my beautiful Paul Robeson tomatoes:

Believe me, that critter (likely a squirrel since there are small claw marks next to that groove), didn't eat enough to dissuade me from cutting out the chewed part and including that tomato in my raw lasagna. I got quite a few big tomatoes off the vines and a pile of cherry tomatoes (not all are pictured here).

That basil turned into a big pile of pesto - most of the pesto was frozen in ice cube trays. The tomatoes mostly went into my first attempt at raw veggie lasagna.

VEGGIE LASAGNA: This was the first time that I made the I managed to get some photos of the veggie lasagna as I got it started, but was so busy that I didn't have time to take more photos of the process of layering and the finished product.

This tasted really good, but there are a few things I learned:

• Making raw marinara with mostly sundried tomatoes and some fresh tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, salt and a pinch of cayenne is the most brilliant idea ever. It results in a hearty, thick, delicious marinara that I wouldn't hesitate to heat up for pasta. This confirms my desire to get the solar dehydrator done ASAP so I can dry up a pile of tomatoes!
• Processed the pine nut ricotta too long -- resulted in something more like tahini rather than my friend's fluffy pine nut ricotta.
• Use a bigger baking dish - using a smaller baking dish does not mean you will make less.
• Using white truffle infused olive oil on the zucchini was a really good idea.

LEMONS - I also picked a pile of lemons from my friend Regan's yard to make a gallon of lemonade for our weekend at Orr. I also made a gallon of sweet tea using peppermint, spearmint and lavender.