Tomatoes

We've been canning tomatoes!  100 lbs of tomatoes yields 63 quarts.   It took the four of us about 8 hours over two days to get them all done.

Cost:  $48 for 100 lbs of tomatoes.   Plus lids, rings and jars.  

And in the nick of time, too.   We're down to a single jar of last year's tomatoes left.

We'll use them to make sauces, tomato soup with lots of basil and thyme, minestrone with beans, squash and a bit of oregano.   Best winter food ever.

Spaghetti Sauce Season

Am I the only one whose kitchen is a total disaster area when I'm doing major canning?

Right now, I've got three large pots of tomatoes, squash, onions and garlic on the stove, simmering down into spaghetti sauce.   There is juice and seeds all over the table, the countertops and floor.  There is burnt schmutz all over the pots and stove and spatters on everything close by.

It's inelegant, but real. [#marthastewart'sstaffdoesn'tlivehere]  And will be real tasty, too, in a few hours.  

Indigo Rose Tomato

Seriously, how cute are these baby tomatoes?   They are Indigo Rose tomatoes.   Eric brought them home to me when the puppy ate the containers of baby tomatoes I had grown myself.   We weren't sure how many I'd be able to save, so he got several -  whatever looked interesting.  

I can't wait to see this one ripe.   I hope it tastes as good as it looks.

Tomatoes Mean Spaghetti Sauce

Confession:  Our tomatoes are just so-so this year.   So I went to a local place [Reeves Greenhouses, just north of Worthington, In] and got 100 lbs of canning tomatoes.    They were nice ones, too!    I got the boxes of small ones because frankly, I don't care what size they are and I figured those would be the hardest for them to get rid of, so I was happy to take them off their hands.    I paid $10 for 25 lb box, which I thought was a good deal given that I didn't have to grow them or pick them.   I canned 3 boxes and each box netted 14 quarts of plain canned tomatoes.   The final box I saved back to make sauces with.    This year we're making regular spaghetti sauce and Tomato Jam, Claire's favorite ketchup of all time. [Links below].

As it looks like a good year for tomatoes in general, I always advise to get as much as you can afford, can them quickly and easily and then decide what to do with them later.   Plain canned tomatoes are one of the most versatile and healthy things we can store.   And they taste way better than what you get at the store.

I am a lazy tomato canner.   I core them and cut them into big hunks and squash them into jars.   No peeling.   Then I follow the directions from the Ball Blue Book [link in the book list on the sidebar] for canning fresh pack quarts. [1 tsp salt, 2 tablespoons lemon juice, fill with hot water, process 45 minutes in boiling water bath.]  Easy squeezy.

Here are some things I do with my beautiful jars of tomatoes:

• Enchilada Sauce
• Tomato Jam [It's glorified ketchup, but the best darn ketchup you've ever had.]
• Minestrone or a variation thereof.
• Tomasqua [great for a glut of summer squash along with the tomatoes]
• Spaghetti Sauce [below.]

Robin's Spaghetti Sauce
www.rurification.com

• garlic
• onions
• olive oil
• butter
• canned tomatoes
• salt
• dried basil, oregano, thyme and parsley.

Here's my approach to spaghetti sauce.  It's not really a recipe, but more of a process.  I don't measure.  It's always fantastic. It's always easy.   In fact, Claire has taken over making this sauce and hers is even better.   [She won't tell me her secret.]

1.  Slice up some onions and garlic and saute them in olive oil and butter until transparent.
2.  Open a couple of jars of tomatoes or tomasqua and dump it in with the onions.
3.  Cook it down, down, down until it's the consistency you want. 
4.  Add dried oregano [plenty], salt [to taste], basil [plenty], thyme [generous pinch], and parsley [generous pinch].  Stir it well.
5.   Grind it all up in the blender to pulverize the skins and vegetable chunks.   My crew prefers smooth sauce.

For canning:  put into clean jars and cover with clean lids and rings.  Process according to instructions in the Ball Blue Book [link in the book list on the sidebar] or another reputable canning instruction source.

If you want to make a meat sauce, then cook up some ground beef or sausage until it's crumbly and crispy, then add it to the sauce.    [Note:  I do not can meat sauce.]  

Cherry Tomatoes

Tomatoes.   Goddess of the midwestern garden.   We love them raw, hot, straight off the vine.   We love them sliced on sandwiches and in salads.  We love them juiced and pureed in soups and sauces.

We love tomatoes. 

Except for Lily, who really doesn't care for them at all thank you very much. 

Weird, huh.


I grew two types of cherry tomatoes this year.   I had been planning on just one variety, but one from last year volunteered All Over The Place and I just left a few to see what they'd do.    Now I know.

The darker cherry tomatoes are Black Cherry.   I got the seed from Baker Creek.   These are fantastic little tomatoes!  I love them.   They're sweet and delicious.  Instead of turning red, they turn sort of brownish-pinkish and they stayed sort of greenish on top this year.    Weird.   But don't let that stop you from trying these.   They are prolific and excellent tomatoes. I will definitely do these again!

The other cherry tomatoes where volunteers from last year.   Principe Borgese.  They're a grape tomato [which, honestly, are just like cherry tomatoes in my opinion.  Seriously.  I can't tell the difference.]  They lasted last year until frost and produced and produced and produced.   These are great little tomatoes.   More acidic than the Black Cherry ones above, but easy and prolific.   I like these a lot.


See yesterday's post for a description of the big tomatoes that I grew this year.  

Tomatoes

The tomatoes took their sweet time this year.  

I mean really took their time.  We didn't have ripe ones until August.  

There they sat.   Mocking me.   Tiny green tomatoes.    Then finally they started to ripen.   Our harvest is much smaller this year due to the long, cool, wet spring.  




That said, I did plant some good ones and have some terrific recommendations for you.

This is Amana Orange.   I got the seed from Baker Creek.   Nicely sized meaty tomatoes.   It looks more yellow than orange to me, but it's a good tomato with a nice flavor.    This one ripened first this year.

This is Brave General, also from Baker Creek.

It's another terrific tomato.  Good sized and meaty.   Well formed.   I'll be growing this one again.  

This is Amish Paste.  It's a glorified roma, but bigger.   Meaty and well formed.  This is K2's favorite of all.


I'll talk about the cherry tomatoes tomorrow.

Mini Greenhouse Veggie Starters

My genius friend Sharon told me about these a couple of years ago.    They're milk jugs.    You use them as mini greenhouses to start seeds in.   I use them for my peppers, tomatoes and eggplants.  

Start things early [in February, here] and they can stay all snug in the jugs until it's safe to plant them out in May.   In the meantime they can get big in these.

And they're double protected from goofy March weather because I keep these mini greenhouses inside the cold frames and hoop house where it's not going to freeze.

Genius, right?    I love them!



This is what you do.

Save your milk jugs.   Then cut them like this.  Cut all the way around but don't cut them under the handle.   This gives them a lid that stays on, but that you can bend open if you need to.

I cut them with scissors - just stab the scissors in right there under the handle and cut, cut, cut.

Then I poke holes in the bottoms using a skewer.  Or a screwdriver.   Or Lily's pocket knife because she always has it with her and my pocketknife is always in my purse.   Except for that one time that I took it out before I went on an airplane because I didn't want to be arrested for potential terrorism or have it confiscated because it's a cool little pocketknife. 

Poke lots of holes.  Maybe 8-10.

Usually I forget to poke the holes in the jugs until I have a couple of these full.   I hate that.   That's why I'm reminding you to poke your holes before you put the dirt in.

So don't forget.  

Then I fill the bottoms with this stuff.  From right to left:   chicken dirt, sand, potting soil. 

I love chicken dirt.   You can read about it here and here.

In this order, I put in 2 scoops of chicken dirt, 4 scoops of sand and 4-6 scoops of potting soil.

Or you can use plain old dirt.   It works too.

Then I plant my seeds and put labels in the jugs.

Don't forget the labels.   If you grow 6 varieties of peppers, you'll want to know which one is which.   Or not.   It might be fun to plant a big row and see what's what later. 

I spray everything down really well with a spray bottle full of water and I bend the lids back over to close them up so they stay nice and snug and then I tuck them in the cold frame or hoop house. 

Check them occasionally to make sure they don't dry out too much.    Seeds do not like dry.   Keep them moist.

This will give you a nice head start on veggie production for the season.   That's important when you have a kid whose only vegetable is tomatoes.   

Pantry Staples

In 2011 we had a bumper crop of tomatoes, so I canned tomatoes.   And then I canned more.   And then I canned more.

We still have a few jars of them in the pantry.

Which is fabulous because I can take those plain old jars of tomatoes and make them into something wonderful now.   

Like enchilada sauce.    

Because I love enchilada sauce.

I didn't know that I loved enchilada sauce way back in 2011 when I canned these tomatoes.  

It's a good thing they were just plain tomatoes. 

So I took six of those aging quart jars of tomatoes and cooked them down by half and then sieved all the skins and seeds out and made a triple batch of my enchilada recipe and now I have fresh new pint jars of enchilada sauce in the pantry instead of aging quart jars of tomatoes.

Which brings me to my point about pantry staples.  

When you have a surplus, store as much as you can in a simple way that can be used to make other stuff later.   Like in a year.   Maybe after you've discovered something ToDieFor on Pinterest that you didn't even know you loved.   Or your youngest kiddo loved.  

Can a bunch of vegetables plain.  Put up just plain bottles of fruit.   Or freeze it.   Make simple one-fruit jams that can be jazzed up later with a spice or two.

I'm not suggesting that you do all of your canning this way because it's nice to have fancier stuff already made up so all you have to do is open a jar.  

I'm just suggesting that when you have a surplus, get it put up as easily as possible so that you have the flexibility of doing multiple things with it later.   


Make sense?

Tomato Jam

I have two words for you.   Tomato.  Jam.

To be clear, it's not the kind of jam you eat on toast; it's the kind you eat on a burger or slather all over meatloaf.

OK.  It's really just glorified ketchup, but oh, what fabulous ketchup.

Sort of a cross between ketchup and barbecue sauce.    Seriously fabulous ketchup and seriously fabulous barbecue sauce.

This is a slow jam.   Sloooww.  Jaaaammm.    Take your time with it.  Don't rush it.   Enjoy the smells and use the opportunity to sit nearby and peruse those cookbooks you haven't looked at yet.   Or clean out the tupperware cupboard.   Or read a book with a cup of tea close by.    Slow food is a good thing. 

I made this with a mess of tomatoes that came out of the garden less than slice worthy.   We cooked them up in the slow cooker and then ran them through the chinois to get the skins out.  

Actually, when you run it through the chinois, you don't get the skins out, you get the sauce out.   The skins stay in until you scrape them out and feed them to the chickens, who like them, but not as much as they like strawberry tops.

Chickens love strawberry tops more than anything on this earth.    Anything.    I asked.   The chickens said, 'Strawberry tops, hands down.'

Now you know.

Anyway.  You don't have to start with fresh tomatoes.   You can just open a big can of tomato sauce.  

Once you have the sauce, this is what you do:

Tomato Jam
from www.rurification.com

• 1 Tablespoon olive oil
• 1 large onion, minced
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
• 1  cinnamon stick, about 2 inches long
• 3 cups tomato sauce
• 6 Tablespoons brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt

First of all, don't stress out about the cinnamon stick.   It doesn't matter how curly it is, or how thick it is or if it's exactly 2 inches.   I'm talking sort of 2 inches.    If that's too stressful, then use 1/8 tsp of cinnamon powder and add more to taste if you want to.

Cook the onion, garlic vinegar and cinnamon stick in the olive oil until the onion begins to caramelize, about 40 minutes.  Or longer.  Don't rush it.  

Add the tomato sauce, sugar and salt.   Cook until thick.   Remember that it will thicken even more after it cools.   I cook mine in a big skillet until I can draw a flat topped spatula across the bottom of the pan and it leaves a trail for a second.   Thick.

Ladle into jars.   Enjoy!

Note:  You don't have to cook yours that thick.  If you leave it thinner, or don't caramelize the onions,  it tastes fine.  But it's better the other way.  Just sayin.

You can find this recipe and a bunch more jam recipes in my ebook.  Check out the preview [link on the sidebar].  A Simple Jar of Jam: 180+ recipes & variations for jam using low sugar pectin.  Every purchase goes a long way toward supporting the blog.   Thank you!

Enchilada Sauce

Our tomatoes have been weird.

Really weird.

I'm sure it was the heat and drought.    The heat and drought toughened up their skins.

Then it rained and rained and those tomatoes grew, but the tough skins didn't grow - they split.   The vast majority of tomatoes we've gotten have split skins.

And the damp from all that rain encouraged the romularia spot and it flourished and all the leaves turned yellow and brown and  then died.   It was pathetic.   

Then there was the bird from hell that would land on a vine and just take random bites out of the very best and most beautiful tomatoes.  I probably lost 1/3 to 1/2 of my tomatoes that way.    We finally had to net the whole tomato bed to keep the blasted thing out.

But every once in a while, I'd bring in a bunch of tomatoes - mostly grape tomatoes and damaged bigger ones, and we'd chop them up and can them.    Ugly tomatoes are tasty, too.

The last batch we didn't have time to watch, so Eric put the whole bunch in our big new oval crock pot.  It was filled to the top and we cooked it for two days -  cooking it down, down, down until we had just over a half a gallon of tomato goo left.   Then I sieved the whole mess through my chinois so that there wouldn't be any skins because the kids hate skins.

[I rolled my eyes the whole time, but I did it.   Because I'm a good Mom.   And because Eric suggested that it was the nice thing to do.  And I needed the brownie points.

It occurs to me that I probably lost brownie points with every eye roll, huh.  Rats.]

And I made enchilada sauce to put up in jars.   Because I love enchiladas.  But I don't love making stuff like that at the last minute.    At the last minute, I just want to throw it all together.

So, here is the basic recipe for Enchilada Sauce by the quart.   Just multiply this by the number of quarts of cooked tomatoes or tomato sauce you have.  I adapted this recipe from the one in America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook.  

Enchilada Sauce

• 1 quart tomato sauce
• 3-4 Tablespoons chili powder
• 2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 onion, diced
• 3 cloves garlic, minced

I cooked up the onion and garlic and then added the spices to that.  After that had heated through,  I added the tomato sauce at the end, heated it all to a boil and then put it in jars to seal up.   I ended up with exactly four pints.   I"m so happy!

For more recipes as easy as this one, check out my ebook on the sidebar.  It's full of recipes for savory glazes, chutneys and sauces, too!  Want to see a preview?   Check out the link on my sidebar.   A Simple Jar of Jam: 180+ recipes & variations for jam using low sugar pectin.  Every purchase goes a long way toward supporting the blog.   Thank you!

Last of the Tomatoes

and the last of the nasturtiums.    

Tomasqua - to can which Robin uses the pressure canner for the first time.

We always have an abundance of tomatoes and yellow squash of some sort in the garden.   It's too much to eat fresh, so I cut them all up and combine the tomatoes and squash and can it together.  We call it tomasqua [emphasis on the second syllable:  to-MAH-squa].

This stuff makes a great base for sauces of all kinds:  marinara, enchilada, chili, etc.   We love it.

Seriously.   We love it. 

Since the squash is denser than the tomatoes and much less acidic, I wanted to pressure can it this year - just in case.   We've never had any spoilage with 2 T of lemon juice in each bottle, canned the regular way, but still....

This was a perfect chance for me to learn to use Big Blue.

Remember Big Blue?  I got brave and used it to can that tomasqua. 

I followed the instructions for this make of canner - Mirro.  It took a lot less water than I thought - you don't fill it up, you only put in a couple of inches of water in the bottom to can with.

I heated the water, put in the jars, sealed it up, put the jiggler on, really heated it up, adjusted the heat so it wouldn't jiggle just enough,  let it process for the required time, turned it off,  let it cool for an hour, then pulled the jars out.   The jars were still 'boiling' when I pulled them out of the canner after the hour of cooling time.    They continued to 'boil' for almost an hour after that.    I know they weren't hot enough to boil the regular way, so I'm assuming some other sort of physical process was going on.   If you know what it is, let me know.   I'm curious.

If you come by a used pressure canner, snap it up!  You can probably order replacement parts for it online and someone will have posted the manual as well.   I was lucky enough to get my manual with the canner, but we did find it online, too. 

Next, I'm going to think about canning chicken stock.   

Heirloom Tomatoes

It was a big year for me in the garden.   I planted a bunch of stuff from seed.

I'm not very good at seeds.   I plant them too early in little pots and then they take off and then they dry out and then they flop and then they don't do so well after that.    It makes me nuts.


For years, I bought tomatoes, eggplant, fennel, etc. in pots.    It worked fine, but we've been very limited as to the available varieties.   A few hybrid tomatoes and peppers and whatever single variety of eggplant, fennel and leeks they have - if any.

Sioux on the vine

 I wanted more variety.   And then I discovered Baker Creek and one trip through their catalog had me wondering if I ought to try seeds again.    I started slowly last year.   Then this year I thought I'd try tomatoes - and it worked!    I grew beautiful tomatoes!


[To be completely honest, I bought one plant of Early Girl just in case all my seedlings died.  She, of course, took right off and bore first.] 

Bonny Best

I tried these varieties:

• Bonny Best
• Hazelfield
• Sioux
• Red Zebra
• Riesentraub

The Bonny Best is at the end of a row, away from the sprinkler.   It's a smaller plant, and I wonder if it just didn't get the water the other plants got and that's why it's smaller.   The fruit is round and regular, but not huge. 

Hazelfield

Hazelfield is a great producer.   Very large plants, very large fruit.  Some is irregularly shaped - like the one in the  top left of the photo [right].   They take their time ripening, but the yield is worth it.  

Sioux tomatoes

Sioux is also a very heavy bearer.  The fruit is also large and sometimes irregular.    These ripened about a week before the Hazelfield. 






Red Zebra was my effort to try a type of tomato that wasn't red.    I'm just not into the yellow and lighter tomatoes.    My kids talked me into these.  

Green tomatoes - Red Zebra

The fruit are smallish, but by golly,  they're adorable.   The stripes show up even when they're green so you'll be able to tell which plant this is as soon as it sets fruit. 

Red Zebra Tomatoes

The biggest surprise for me is that this is a delicious tomato!    It's got a dry pink flesh that will be perfect for sauces.   I loved it.  

I'm especially pleased with this tomato because I have never been able to grow romas.   These are even better!

I'm hoping for a bumper crop of these.   I've got big plans to oven roast these with some olive oil and garlic.   Then pop them in jars to freeze for the winter.    Mmmmmm.




Now that I know I can grow things from seed, I'm sold on heirloom tomatoes.    Now I just need to learn how to save seed so I can grow them again next year.