Have a glut of homegrown tomatoes you're trying to get rid of? THIS is what to do with those extra tomatoes: slow roast 'em.
I've discovered many, many, many, many things about myself over the years. Things like my weird love of the word many.
But the most important thing I've learned about myself is that I will always take seconds. If I make dinner, I will get up for seconds. If I go out for dinner to a friend's or relative's house I will get up for seconds.
It doesn't matter how side splittingly full I am after the first plate, I want more. My stomach could be so stretched out from food that I'm screaming in pain and I would still fart my way over to the casserole and take another helping.
I'm fun like that.
Once I understood this interesting fact about myself, I conspired to trick myself. It was kindda hard. I'm clever, but on the other hand … so am I.
I came up with a plan a couple of years ago and I've fooled myself with it ever since. Think this whole fooling myself thing is dumb? How many of you out there change the time on your bedside clock and yet every single morning you wake up too stupid to know what time it really is.
So what I do (knowing I will NO MATTER WHAT take a second serving of food) is make my first serving smaller. Yeah. It was that simple. Instead of my regular end of the day lumberjack sized serving, I take a little less. So when I get my second serving, I'm really only eating the amount of food I would normally eat (not necessarily *should* eat).
I'm a profound overeater at dinner. More than once the neighbours have found me rolling around on the front lawn with a fork in one hand and a bottle of Gaviscon in the other crying incoherently about a tumour in my stomach which is really 17 meatballs.
Did somebody say meatballs? I have a great sauce for those!
This summer I swore I wasn't going to waste a single vegetable I grew. That didn't come true. I wasted all kinds. It's almost impossible to use every single thing you grow, or even give it away. You go up to the garden and a watermelon you thought wouldn't be ripe for a few days got ripe overnight and rotten within a few days. Tomatoes are bitten by bacteria riddled raccoon monsters or a cucumber sits on the kitchen counter with good intentions of turning it into something. Which you do. You turn it into a rotting mess.
So when all of my 15 tomato plants started to produce ripe tomatoes at the exact same time I knew I had to formulate a plan or forever think of myself as the tomato waster.
Last year I roasted all of my extra tomatoes and froze them. Which was great. They were delicious. But you still had to make them into a bit of a sauce once you took them out of the freezer. Boil them down a bit, add some liquid, some more seasoning … that sort of thing.
So this year I went another route. I roasted my tomatoes but I added a few more things to the roasting pan and added one more step.
This is really easy so feel free to use only a portion of your brain to read this post.
I forgot to mention to drizzle the bottom of the pan and the top of the tomatoes with olive oil. A pretty good glug.
Roasted Tomato Sauce.
A delicious way to use up the glut of garden tomatoes.
This isn't a recipe that requires strict measurements. As long as you follow the technique you'll end up with delicious sauce.
Ingredients
- 10 or so tomatoes (quartered or halved)*
- 1 onion (peeled and chopped into quarters)
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- 2 cloves whole garlic (do not peel)
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 hot pepper halved, or ¼ teaspoon dried pepper flakes
- salt & pepper to taste
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 300 F.**
- Add everything to a sheet pan and douse with some olive oil. Mix everything up so it's all coated nicely and put the pan in the oven.
- Roast for 3 hours (checking on them and stirring every hour or so).
- When the ingredients look roasted and dark and caramelized in some spots you can take the mixture out of the oven.
- Remove and discard the bay leaf.
- Find the garlic and remove the peel. Add it back to the tomatoes.
- Once everything is cool enough to handle, put it in a blender and blend it up to whatever consistency you like.
- Freeze leftovers.
Notes
- Adding cherry tomatoes if you have access to them will sweeten your sauce beautifully!
- Your roasting temperature might be different. Some ovens run hotter or cooler than others. Check your tomatoes and if after 1.5 hours they aren't showing any signs of roasting at all you can turn your oven up (or down if needed) in 25 degree increments.
- Leaving the peel on the garlic while roasting, helps stop the garlic from drying out. Don't forget to remove the peel before blending.
Just throw everything on the pan. The only thing you really have to remember is only having a single layer on the pan, and allowing space in between the ingredients. This will stop your tomatoes from steaming instead of roasting.
One pan like this will get you around 3 servings of sauce.
Roast everything in the oven at a lowish temperature, (around 300F) for a few hours. You just have to keep checking on them. You only need to stir them 2 or three times to make sure they're evenly roasted.
Once all the ingredients are roasted and your kitchen smells like you really know what you're doing, pull the tomatoes out and let them cool a bit. Remove the bay leaf. If you don't like a lot of heat remove one or both of the peppers.
Now you have 2 choices.
Use the roasted tomatoes on your pasta as is, which is rustic and delicious. Or blend them into more of a sauce.
To make them into a sauce, put everything else in your blender and blend until you like the consistency.
I did one batch completely blended so there was no trace of tomato skins or seeds, and another batch I left more rough, with bits of tomatoes and skin visible.
Then I spooned serving sizes onto a baking sheet lined with wax paper and froze them. Once they're frozen you can just pop them off the waxed paper and put them in a freezer bag or tupperware and return them to the freezer.
I ended up pulling one out right away because I wanted to make chicken parmesan.I always want to make chicken parmesan, but I don't because I can never be bothered to make a whole batch of sauce for the 3 tablespoons I need for the recipe to top the chicken. This sauce, always on hand in the freezer, solves that problem.
It does not however, solve the always taking a second serving problem. At all.
You stole my idea!!! Yeah! I've been making tomato sauce this way for years with excess garden tomatoes. It's almost a roasted ratatouille (sp ?). Try over ripe fruit in the mix too. I started making tomato sauce this way when I got tired of cooked tomato sauce sploops all over my stove. Straining it with the food mill also sucks.
I did! I stole your idea. Your idea is currently in my belly. ;) ~ karen!
We are overeating kin folk. I have the exact same disease. Only I like to go in for thirds quite often. Feeling like you'll explode isn't quite painful enough for the likes of me. I like to add on the chance of vomiting. Then, 30 minutes later, I'm rummaging around for something salty. It's a sickness. A food whore's sickness. I just love all the foods. Hence, the reasoning behind being crowned the craziest Pinterest food hoarding lady. Yeah, I read the comments of people talking smack about my boards on your post. They're just jealous they weren't invited to dinner. ;)
As for THIS post, I have two GIANT bowls of tomatoes in my fridge as I type. I really need to do this tomorrow. I've always frozen slow roasted tomatoes, but never pureed them first. Not a bad idea.
I need to try this! I love recipes where the oven/slow cooker/something else does the majority of the work. great post!
Oh I am so doing this for the weekend.
I was planning on canning, but I just end up feeling overwhelmed with the cleaning and the boiling of stuff. For this weekend this seems totally doable :-D Thank you for the inpiration ♥
Just put my tomatoes, garlic, onions, herbs in the oven. I am so excited!!! Never in a million years would I decide to can those little buggers, but roasting I can do. Thank you so much for this idea. Can't wait to see how fabulous this tastes.
My hubby brought home a flat of hothouse tomatoes - what to do? I saw this and thought oven dried tomatoes turned into sauce - no slaving over a hot stove taking the skins off the tomatoes, seeding them, chopping them and making traditional tomato sauce. Thanks.
Excellent! Since you won't be adding any cherry tomatoes, add about a tablespoon of sugar. Just add it into the blender while you're mixing everything. The hothouse tomatoes won't have very much sweetness to them so it just cuts the acid a bit. And don't forget to roast them, not dry them. Enjoy! ~ karen!
I discovered that zebra tomatoes are ripe with they have a yellow cast to them. So, I've had ONE ripe one. After the snow earlier this month, I've picked a bowl full and they're on the counter, slowly ripening. I had some tomatoes (chopped) in the freeze (since last year), then a friend gave me some fresh ones, so I made salsa out of them yesterday - got almost 10 pints.
Wow, from tomato envy (your tomato taste post), to freezer envy. I could never be able to freeze 25 quarts of tomatoes! No room.
Now I guess I'll read the crappy post from yesterday, lol.
We trick ourselves into eating smaller portions by using smaller plates. Except when we eat corn on the cob, gotta have big plates for corn.
there's nuttin' like the smell of roasting tomatoes!
I have gallons of ripe tomatoes (rare occurrence here western WA) Yum!! This is so good!!! I don't think I'm sharing any more tomatoes. Thank you Karen. Next I try the pizza dough.
Great post, Karen. I just wish it would have come a few weeks ago. Out tomatoes are pretty much done for the year. I was concerned too about wasting good food. I blanched a bunch of ours - peeled them & cut them up in chunks & froze them in baggies to use this Winter for soups & stews. Wish I would have known about roasting them. But - this post is a keeper for future reference. There's always next year. We did eat our way through a number of bacon - tomato & lettuce sandwiches this year. Yum...
YUM my mouth is watering. Much more appetizing than yesterdays lash egg.
Great and easy idea - just up my alley.
That's it??? Really? It's really that easy? Oh how cool! I'm so going to do this!
I JUST got my oven fixed, which was not working for TWO MONTHS! Made meatloaf, bread and a cake the same day! And now I can take care of the tomatoes finally trickling in to ripeness. Strange summer in my garden this year.... Anyway, this recipe arrived in a very timely manner--thanks Karen! Will be recovering from the "lash egg" any day now.
Karen, will I get amazing sauce if I use store bought tomatoes for this recipe? I think mine are done growing, we've been waking to temps in the 40's (F) and the farmers market is sold out by the time I get there after work.
great recipe. I make it almost identical but we roast carrots ( cut up small enough to be done when the onions and garlic are) as well. It adds a lot of sweetness and a lot of authentic Italian sauces use carrots as I discovered from an Italian friend. I love that you freeze small dollops for smaller servings or recipe needs. You are indeed clever. Thank you for being that way and always bringing a smile to my whole face.
We are a family of five and three generations, have a huge third of an acre in garden and we now have over 25 quarts of this roasted sauce in our freezer. Bon appetit.
I have had the same obsession with this years garden. In that I have not wanted to waste ONE tiny thing! Which means I have been canning for about 2.5 months now ....I have run out of room to store everything and also never in my wildest dreams did I EVER think I could use all my canning jars. I have so many in the attic I could start a store with them. I actually had to go out and buy more even after I was given a whole bunch from friends. I am finishing up my tomatoes today. I'm exhausted with it all. I hate to lose ONE tomato! We always have to pick all tomatoes out of the garden before the frost and we got a really hard frost about a month ago and even with the tomatoes covered it got a lot of them. :( However I have many buckets ripening in the house between newspaper layers. I love this idea of roasted and blended! Then freezing instead of canning. I canned a bunch of our sweet 100 cherry toms last year for a pasta sauce I saw on youtube and it was the most disgusting sauce I have ever eaten. I figured that cherry tomatoes just aren't good for sauce. Who knew? However you say they are good....perhaps it's the roasting of them that makes them good in the sauce? Because they were actually bitter in the sauce I made and canned last year. I had to throw it all out.
That sauce looks amazing..I love recipes that are good and so easy..my tomatoes are done but for a couple getting red..but I can still get home grown from the Amish..I'm thinking at least a couple batches for Winter..Thanks for another great one Karen..
Haha, Karen, I am EXACTLY the same. I LOVE seconds. It's like.. the best part! I would rather have seconds than dessert, any day!
I have also taken to the trick of putting much smaller portions on my plate the first time around - you're absolutely right - this is the best trick! Except Thanksgiving. At Thanksgiving, there are just too many good things to not load up my plate when I take little bits of everything, and then the second plate is just as full. But it's eaten off of fine china, so I think that cancels out the calories. Just saying.