Tomatoes - Oven Dried & Reduced Tomato Sauce
Oven dried tomatoes - With our temperamental weather sun drying can be a daunting task, and if the weather turns on you, you could lose your whole batch of tomatoes. If you have a thermofan oven this is the way to go. Cut the tomatoes in half or quarters, depending on size, remove the stem part and place them cut side up on the baking trays and sprinkle lightly with salt. A light sprinkling of sugar can be added if they are not particularly sweet or flavoursome, but this is hardly ever necessary. Turn the oven to 70°C and dry them for a few hours until they are dry but not completely hard. They do not all dry at the same time and you should remove them as they become ready. Store them in the fridge for a few days, or in the freezer if it is a large batch. To enjoy them in salads, pizzas or quiches you may have to reconstitute them, and the best way to turn them into something very special is to soak them in hot water until slightly soft, pat dry and then marinate them in olive oil, garlic and dried basil and origanum.
Reduced tomato sauce - This is my preferred method of preserving a really large quantity of these indispensable gems. Simply wash the tomatoes, cut in half and remove the stem part with a V-shaped cut. Cut into quarters a place them in a large pot - a 7 liter pot does a good quantity at a time. Gently heat them until enough juice has collected at the bottom to start the boiling process. Turn up the heat and bring to the boil. Once the whole lot is boiling stir occasionally. A good guideline for the final consistency is to reduce them to half the volume at this stage. When ready whisk with a stick blender until smooth. Fill two liter ice-cream tubs with the sauce, leave to cool and place in the freezer. Once frozen they can be popped out, into plastic bags and stacked in the freezer for whenever your recipe calls for really fantastic tomatoes.
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Reduced tomato sauce - This is my preferred method of preserving a really large quantity of these indispensable gems. Simply wash the tomatoes, cut in half and remove the stem part with a V-shaped cut. Cut into quarters a place them in a large pot - a 7 liter pot does a good quantity at a time. Gently heat them until enough juice has collected at the bottom to start the boiling process. Turn up the heat and bring to the boil. Once the whole lot is boiling stir occasionally. A good guideline for the final consistency is to reduce them to half the volume at this stage. When ready whisk with a stick blender until smooth. Fill two liter ice-cream tubs with the sauce, leave to cool and place in the freezer. Once frozen they can be popped out, into plastic bags and stacked in the freezer for whenever your recipe calls for really fantastic tomatoes.
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