Monday, September 21, 2009

Drying Tomatoes

On Wednesday I decided to dry some of my cherry tomatoes when my full of great ideas and make work projects inspiring and motivational friend told me how yummy they were.  I started them off in my solar dryer and then finished then in the oven once the sun went down and they were, as she had promised, delicious.





See how good they look?
So...being the sort of person I am I went to pick a whole box full of cherry tomatoes on Thursday and planned to dry them as well, paying little attention to the fact that we also had plans to go camping on Friday morning.  Solar drying was out since I didn't get home with the tomatoes until late afternoon so I needed to find a way to fit as many as possible into the oven at once.






I love the mix of types of tomatoes and colours all together.

I also ended up with one batch of...ahem, let's say very carmelized tomatoes. ;-)  These I will take to that inspiring friend so we can both have a good laugh at our overdo it tendencies.    I'm sure I was trying to pack, stew tomatoes, make dog food, do laundry and tidy up while these ones spent just a little too long in the oven.  (I know my friend will appreciate how crazy it is that we both do these sorts of things (regularly) but will also acknowledge the fact that neither one of us would choose to live life any way other than full on.)

But most of them turned out just fine - incredibly intensely flavoured little bits of summertime, which will be delightful on our weekly pizza nights come Winter.

And since I was already in town picking cherry tomatoes you know I had to pick a bunch of beefsteak tomatoes which were overripe and going to waste.  They were crying out to be stewed and tucked away for wintertime soups.

And, we still managed to get away for a gorgeous, almost Autumn weekend of camping.  I think camping might be done for the year so it felt especially good to make the time to get away.

5 comments:

Anne said...

Just got back from the coast. Getting to my tomatoes today. Time to clean up the garden I guess, can't put it off any longer. Happy Autumn!

Just Jenn said...

Ah! You're brilliant! I was just wondering what I should do with all the cherry tomatoes left on our vine... drying them sounds *perfect*. BTW yours came out lovely (well except the one batch) and your stewed toms look so pretty too.

Heather said...

Hi Jenn, I have another big bowl of cherry tomatoes sitting on the counter to do something with this morning. This weekend I tried out a delicious Jamie Oliver recipe for a balsamic cherry tomato sauce. I liked it so much that I think I will make a big batch and freezer it in smaller containers for Winter use.

Just Jenn said...

The sauce sounds delicious! What are you pairing it with? Do you have a link to the recipe or was it out of a book?

Heather said...

Hi Jenn

THe sauce is in Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food book (pg 267). It is a cherry tomato, caper and balsamic sauce. He notes to serve it hot with fish, meat or pasta. The flavours in the sauce are amazing when made with plenty of garlic, balsamic vinegar and fresh sweet tomatoes.