Gardening: What to do with Tomatoes

[mistycshore]

I learned the coolest thing. You can freeze tomatoes whole - no skinning or seeding necessary. Wash them well and just pop them little buggers in the freezer until they are hard and put them in a freezer bag. Suck out the air with a straw and put them back in the freezer. Works with slicers, cherry tomatoes, whatever. Also works with whole cherries and peaches. Use them in place of canned tomatoes (all that juice is still in them).

Another cool thing: Cut tomatoes in half and sprinkle with olive oil, dried thyme, oregano (or just Italian seasoning), a bit of chopped garlic, and salt and pepper. Pop them into a 400 degree oven for an hour. Super yummy (like: 5-star good) served whole over pasta with no changes, or (after straining in a colendar - a *lot* of liquid stays in the pan), just run it through a blender and it makes better tomato sauce than you could ever buy. Again, I didn't skin or seed and it didn't matter! The sauce is quite sweet. It's also not runny, the way it would be if you tried to make sauce out of slicers the old-fashioned way and have to stir the sauce over heat for hours and hours and hours to get it to a proper sauce consistency. Suck the excess air out of the feezer bag and pop your prize in the freezer. This also works with anything from slicers to cherry tomatoes (but I'd cut the cooking time for cherries)

Happy gardening!

[dgillz]

Yum. Sounds nice.

In this economy a lot of people are getting back to gardening and canning and the like. Works for me because it also keeps me out of the bar!

[mistycshore]

Me too, dgillz, but I must admit that I'm developing a huge resentment against squash bugs. Destructive little things - and creepy too! Plus, : all they do is eat and mate, and I swear sometimes they're doing both simultaneously.

But I won't drink over it, LOL. Actually, since they're hard to squash, the lady at the nursery told me to catch them and pop them in a jar of alcohol.

They are too many now though and they're too large for ladybugs to handle and I don't think a preying mantis could get through their armor. I dunno - black widows are starting look appealing.