I'm going to have to do something with the tomatoes

[bearfan454]

This is the first garden I've had in several years. The tomatoes are starting to burn up here in West Texas. I've eaten a lot of them but the food dehydrator will make me some for dried ones for pizza and chili this fall and winter. I might can some of them too.

[Historic NY]

1. My old Italian friend says his wife used to can them...

now she cuts them up and freezes them. You could give them a blanch to take off the skins. I bought freezer quality containers and make them into sauce too.

[Arkansas Granny]

8. I've never frozen tomatoes, but a friend says she freezes them whole with skins on.

When they thaw, the skins slip tight off and she uses them in any recipe that calls for canned tomatoes or she purees them for tomatoe sauce.

[Historic NY]

12. Works better...

I remember those growing up canning sessions starting at 5am, a couple aunts would help my grandmother in the summer kitchen, while we would pick baskets and carry them in. It sure was a long day. My grandmother in the middle would take a bunch of the bad tomatoes and cut them up for a pot of sauce. We'd have a late dinner, while the jars cooled. Ah the old days.

[Arkansas Granny]

13. When we did any canning I got to wash the jars because my hands

were slender and flexible enough to fit inside a standard mason jar. No dishwasher in those days.

[NRaleighLiberal]

2. Some ideas (we are working through a daily picking of 30+ lbs)

Gazpacho
Tomato Bisque
Pasta Alla Norma
Slow dehydrate and use on pizza or a crostata
Roasted sauce
Pico di gallo
Can (we have 14 quarts so far)
Provencale over rice
Uncooked chunky marinated tomatoes over pasta

Erc

[bearfan454]

3. That's a lot

I wish mine made that many.

[NRaleighLiberal]

4. Got 125 plants, all different varieties!

[The Polack MSgt]

18. You are the Tomato Master. I've read some of your articles -

Out in the real world, so I'm not surprised you have so many plants. I never wondered what you did with all the tomatoes tho...

I guess I just thought you gave away most of the fruit.

How ae you plants holding up under the onslaught these past dew days? - It's been brutally hot here in the prairie

[NRaleighLiberal]

21. My garden really is an R and D laboratory - and we do lots of

processing and preserving so our harvest takes us through the year (I don't eat fresh tomatoes between our last and next year's first - yes, a tomato snob!).

Keeping the garden going has been brutal this year - everything is in straw bales or containers, so it is once or twice a day watering. But it is so worth it!

[enough]

5. If you really have too much to deal with at one time,

you can put them in the freezer whole, skin on, uncooked. Put them on cookie sheets or something else flat, one layer, then when fully frozen put them into bags. When you’re ready to use them, take out as many as you want and cook any way you want. It’s a great method when the tomato harvest gets to be too much to process. We’ve done this in my family for years.

[bearfan454]

10. Thanks nt

[elleng]

20. Sounds good! Neighbor gave me some, I made sauce last week,

but if I receive more, may use your method.

[CrispyQ]

6. Wish you could send some my way.

[Ohiogal]

7. I have had good luck freezing tomatoes in Ziplock bags

If you can, skin them first. Mash down, put into bags, press the air out.

Come January you’ll have delicious tomatoes for chili and spaghetti sauce.

[applegrove]

9. Scalloped tomatoes for dinner?

[Arkansas Granny]

14. Wow. I haven't had that in ages.

[applegrove]

15. My mom didn't go to church. Instead she made scalloped tomatoes for us for lunch when we got back.

I made it for my parents 35 years later. They loved it.

[Arkansas Granny]

16. I associate the dish with cucumbers and onion in Pyrex dishes with

a vinegar dressing at pot luck dinners in the summertime.

[applegrove]

17. Oh yes. Cukes in the summer. Remember cucumber sandwiches? I told

a friend about them and that they were a delicacy and offered to make them and she didn't think i was serious. She called an aunt to verify they were an actual summer dish. I never made them for her. But i have for myself. Now i like cukes on a toasted bagel with cream cheese.

[irisblue]

11. NRalieghLiberal gazpacho is the best I've ever had & made.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/115729307

[NRaleighLiberal]

23. thanks pal -very kind of you to say!

make it once so far....my tomato bisque gives it a run for the money (made that too last week)

[elleng]

28. Sounds good; have never made it,

and SO sorry small lunch place near my DC office (10+ year ago) has closed (as has my office!) Was a GREAT lunch!

[dem in texas]

19. I used to can mine -all summer long

I would raise them from seed which I stared in the house in Feb, then put in the garden in April. I tried all types, Brandywine was my hands down favorite. Donna and Mortgage Lifter were good producers. I would can 6 jars very night after I finished clearing the kitchen from dinner. The most I ever canned in one season was 55 quarts. I though I'd never use all in one year, but I did.

I'm too old to garden now, plus I can't afford the water bill. So funny, the squirrels would steal the tomatoes and put on a tree branch at the edge of my garden then nibble and eat the stolen tomatoes. One year I was growing the vintage tomato type, the Olympic, a huge red and yellow streaked tomato and to squirrels tried their best to get them, I had to tie aluminum pans on the fence and found an owl decoy somewhere and put that on a post.

We went to the farmers market today and bought some big ripe East Texas tomatoes.

[NRaleighLiberal]

22. When it is happy with the weather, Brandywine is unbeatable for flavor

55 Quarts - wow! Our realistic goal this year is 21-28 quarts - When we get 25 lbs of tomatoes, we can do 7 quarts. So far, 14 done, another 7 possible tomorrow...it is hard to NOT eat them fresh, but impossible to keep up with them, so canning is a good solution. Amazing ingredient for winter soups!

When my daughter lived in Abilene, I mailed her plants - she did great with them there! (chip off the old block!)

[dem in texas]

27. Yes, growing Brandywines are hit and miss, especailly in Texas

I used to plant some every year, if it didn't get hot early, I could get a good crop of them. The year I canned 55 quarts, I was begging jars from all my family and friends. I where I worked, we had a kitchen and several crock pots and we'd all bring ingredients to make stew about every other week, so a lot of my tomatoes when to the office stew pot.

[Lugnut]

24. I slice, roast and freeze them.

I cut them into thick slices and spread out on a baking sheet and season them. Roast at 350 degrees for about 30 - 40 minutes, cool and put them into ziplock bags. When I want to make pasta sauce I dump a bagful into a large pot with three cans of Hunt's tomato sauce and give them a whirl with the immersion blender. Delicious sauce.

[bearfan454]

25. Darn it!

I cut up about a dozen tomatoes and put them on the dehydrator trays with a little Kosher salt and went to turn on the dehydrator and it doesn't work. I hadn't used it in several years. So it's tin foil on cookie sheets on the top rows of the oven and the oven is on 150°F. I guess I'll check them in a couple of hours.

[Botany]

26. Salsa

You can can it.