Kitchen

[Spacrazy]

@Annabellethecat66 :  Your posts make my day but I didn’t know how much you love tomatoes till now (I love them, too).

If you didn’t know about it let me tell you about the annual Tomato Festival in Jacksonville, Texas. It is the second weekend in June annually and it is everything tomatoes all year long.

You will love it.

[hellokitty]

I can most of my vegetables but I do freeze a few.  I do not blanch.

[Sooner]

The latest Instant Pot has a function for canning things.  That would be nice.  Although you can put up tomatoes using the water bath method.  I used to do that and they were good! 

[Carmie]

I usually freeze tomatoes and did so this year again.  I do them in batches and different ways.  Some I cook down and  put into a blender to make them smooth.

 Some I just wash and freeze whole with the skins on.  When I want to use them, I run them under cold water while frozen and the skin just peels right off.  Mostly use for soups this way.

Some get diced and put into the blender raw.

And finally I freeze some of the cooked purée with fried peppers, both mild and hot, some with and some without onions.

I use Freezer safe zip lock bags and freeze them flat.  Then I store in a storage container standing up on their ends like books.  They take up little room in my freezer.

I freeze everything this way.

I sometimes freeze blanched green beans, but didn't do any this year.

[fthunt]

@Annabellethecat66 Interesting read A-cat.  My parents also had acres of v garden and my widowed grandmother loved to can everything - big cooking pressure cooker sizzled away day after day......... and she could snip beans faster than a spider moves.  Cellar basement had rows and rows and shelves and shelves of canned goods.  Ahh no Wegmen's then. 

So  - me off to the market tomorrow to see what's left in veggie department - hope for beans and tomatoes before the pumpkin flood.

Thanks for your input - to be safe - think I'll blanch the beans if available.

[drizzellla]

I find it is so easy to just can tomatoes. So easy to do and don't have to worry about the freezer, if the power goes out or if I have enough room.

I blanch them because I peel the skin off all the tomatoes. It makes such a good sauce because I determine what I want. If I don't want any seeds I make sure I take out all the seeds. If I want the tomatoes thick I cook them a bit. 

[fthunt]

Lots of good tips here - I didn't know from frozen  (tomato)  to cold water bath = easy skin off.

Who knew?

Thanks - I'll keep reading!

[sabatini]

I freeze roasted tomatoes all the time. They come in handy!

Large or Roma tomatoes, I slice thickly, and cherry or grapes tomatoes are left whole, unless they're very big, then they're sliced in half.

Lay on a foil lined cookie sheet, drizzle w/ olive oil & roast in a low oven. 

Remove from oven when done to your liking, cool, then put the whole sheet into the freezer. When frozen, pop the tomatoes off the foil and place in Ziploc bags.

SO MANY uses, and SO delicious!

Tossed w/ angel hair pasta: saute garlic in olive oil, splash in some white wine, then add the frozen roasted tomatoes and simmer just until heated through, toss w/ angel hair, add Parmesan. 

Smear on toasted baguette w/ goat cheese & fresh basil.

Use on your homemade pizza.

Add to anything at all.

I wish I had your bumper crop! 

[Carmie]

@sabatini   I never though of doing that. They sound delicious.  I'd probably eat them before I got them into the freezer.  Yumm.

[AuntMame]

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@sabatini wrote:

I freeze roasted tomatoes all the time. They come in handy!

Large or Roma tomatoes, I slice thickly, and cherry or grapes tomatoes are left whole, unless they're very big, then they're sliced in half.

Lay on a foil lined cookie sheet, drizzle w/ olive oil & roast in a low oven. 

Remove from oven when done to your liking, cool, then put the whole sheet into the freezer. When frozen, pop the tomatoes off the foil and place in Ziploc bags.

SO MANY uses, and SO delicious!

Tossed w/ angel hair pasta: saute garlic in olive oil, splash in some white wine, then add the frozen roasted tomatoes and simmer just until heated through, toss w/ angel hair, add Parmesan. 

Smear on toasted baguette w/ goat cheese & fresh basil.

Use on your homemade pizza.

Add to anything at all.

I wish I had your bumper crop! 

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This is what I do. I used to roast all the extra tomatoes along with garlic, peppers and onions. I would also roast all the green tomatoes from the garden. Then I'd chop everything up into salsa which I would freeze. Would add it to Tex-Mex and chili all through the winter. But simply roasting the tomatoes and freezing them is so much easier and just as good.