Saving Summer (1 Viewer)

[FLATU8ER]

I am about to be overwhelmed by cherry sized roma tomatoes. I want to save these for use later in the year, IE: Sauce, salsa, etc. I don't can, as in mason jars, and boiling water. I have thought about roasting/smoking/boiling and the like, then vacume sealing. Has anyone had experience in this method.
No I have not done any research on the inter web, as I trust my Mud Brothers more. I do realize that the berries will not hold any kinda shape, but I still want to retain a useable product. Cause a fresh smoky salsa at a Christmas party sounds really good.
-Jim

 

[BrotherRob]

I don't think anything you do with them will preserve the goodness of fresh home grown maters. I usually eat what I can and share the rest.

You might take a shot at drying some. Sun dried maters are always good. We made our own raisins when I was a kid. We just speaded grapes on a screen and let the sun do the work.

 

[rusty_tlc]

First canning is a lot easier than you might think, we can a lot. Canning salsa is recommended as a good starter project since you can do it with simple water bath method. If you have a big pot the investment to get into water bath canning is minimal.

Second, in our pre-canning days we would make tomato sauce and freeze it.
It works best if you have a food mill that will separate the seeds and skin from the pulp. We never had one. Larger tomatoes we would blanch skin and seed. Smaller tomatoes we would just cook down a bit then blend in the pot with a stick blender. The result would go into freezer bags.
This yields a products that is about as good as store bought but at least we didn't waste the harvest.
We also just blanched and froze chopped up tomatoes, then when we had time we would cook them down into sauce.

@BrotherRob agreed nothing like a fresh homegrown tomato still warm from the sun. But I do love to have a case or two of home canned chopped tomatoes in the cupboard. It's probably just mental but they taste better than store bought to me.

 

[FLATU8ER]

Yea I'm agreeing with you guys. I do like the blanch and freeze idea. Also was thinking about the sun dried method, but using the oven. As we have lots of flies around here. Processing tomatoes have been and are actively being harvested around here.
BTW, speaking of sun dried, has anyone tried the sun dried tomato ketchup? Saw it on store shelves but never purchased it.

 

[spressomon]

My fave (used Early Girls): Slice in 1/2...cut side up...single layer...slow, as in very slow and low, over hardwood coals to dry. But not too dry. Single layer atop a wire rack'd sheet pan in the freezer. Vac & seal in suitable portion size packets. Freeze.

I use them for sauce for pasta, winter salsa, sliced/cut into green salad, base for gazpacho and on and on and on.

More about the above here: http://komodokamadoforum.com/topic/4933-slow-roasted-tomatoes/?hl=tomatoes

Or can them per Rusty/DJ.

 

[BrotherRob]

BTW, speaking of sun dried, has anyone tried the sun dried tomato ketchup? Saw it on store shelves but never purchased it.

I don't see the point. Ketchup is ketchup, gourmet ketchup is still just ketchup. Use your Sun dried for something tasty.

 

[FLATU8ER]

OK, when the garden was planned I told the wife to buy the larger roma plants, and to only but 2. Well she came home with a pony pack (6 pack), and 5 survived. Varieties were mixed, but grew them any way. Harvested and oven dried, vac sealed with EVOO.
We will see later how they turned out when I make something this winter.???

 

[myquestoyota]

I ran a bunch of cherry tomatoes in the dehydrator last yr and they lasted into the winter for soups and stuff.