Posted by Dave Riley on October 19, 2021 at 10:22am
There's approximately 1.5 kgm in each bag. The tomatoes take up more storage space than those dried and bottled in olive oil, but these beauties are my favourite cooking tomato.That tangy sweet taste is my delight.You can add them to the pot in numbers to suit yourself.
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After doing some jobs outback I think I still have at least two more harvests in this round. I had planted a mixed seed selection for 'cherry tomatoes' -- so what came up was sure to be a surprise.
Too many grape types I think and not enough of the bigger ones -- but all bushes were extremely productive. No disease problems at all.
So I'm looking at maybe 10 kgm harvest all up ...in this round. That's frozen plus those I dried.
I still have more bushes yet to start to ripen and I just planted some Romas.
Romas can be iffy at my place.
With these smaller tomatoes -- Tommy Toes, etc -- you really need to harvest them with the stem on as the pulled stem hole attracts fruit flies.When I was harvesting Tommy Toes for local restaurants at the Deagon racecourse market garden, we were doing it cutting one stem at a time with a pair of scissors. So if you want your Tommy Toes to have the best flavour and therefore need to keep them out of the fridge, that's the way to go.
It is de riguer and ever so trendy to fry or bake your Tommy Toes with the stem on.
I leave the skins and seeds in and stew them with a grated carrot and onion. I also add a splash of balsamic and a pinch of brown sugar and garlic salt. If I have spare olives, mushrooms or red wine it goes in too.
I am not crazy for tomato sauce or Passata. I like to count out my small tomatoes into each dish. That's seeds and skin too. With these small ones I appreciate the sweet and tangy taste you can measure with plop plop into a dish.
As for the dried ones...in our house they don't last very long because there are so many excuses to eat them. In the fridge they are a temptation while they last.
Because the dried ones have a richer flavour I don't add them to stews. They go well alone on a tortilla with extras or on pizza...or in things like polenta, rice and millet dishes. Great in salads too. With cheese, they excel. They make a great excuse for pasta salads with a simple Balsamic vinaigrette.
If you stew them in olive oil you can get a flavour zing for anthing else you may add for frying.
Thanks for sharing Dave. So you only freeze the toms after picking and they are for cooking later on for sauce etc.
You also pick and dry them straight away while fresh. These dehydrated toms go into olive oil to keep. How long do you think the jars of oiled toms will last?
DIY was simple in that I picked them (that was the hardest part) then removed the stems one by one. Froze them straight after filling the bag.
Note:I did not wash them.
The result is that they will freeze without sticking to one another.
You don't want to harvest after rain, watering or too early in the morning. Separated, it is easy to select the number of toms you need each time for cooking.
When I dry batches, I always halve them or prick and squeeze the very small ones before laying them in the dryer.
Then, as I have pointed out, I dipped them when dried in Balsamic Vinegar and drown them tightly into olive oil filled jars before refrigerating them.
Excuse me while I go outback and harvest some more.
Comments
After doing some jobs outback I think I still have at least two more harvests in this round. I had planted a mixed seed selection for 'cherry tomatoes' -- so what came up was sure to be a surprise.
Too many grape types I think and not enough of the bigger ones -- but all bushes were extremely productive. No disease problems at all.
So I'm looking at maybe 10 kgm harvest all up ...in this round. That's frozen plus those I dried.
I still have more bushes yet to start to ripen and I just planted some Romas.
Romas can be iffy at my place.
With these smaller tomatoes -- Tommy Toes, etc -- you really need to harvest them with the stem on as the pulled stem hole attracts fruit flies.When I was harvesting Tommy Toes for local restaurants at the Deagon racecourse market garden, we were doing it cutting one stem at a time with a pair of scissors. So if you want your Tommy Toes to have the best flavour and therefore need to keep them out of the fridge, that's the way to go.
It is de riguer and ever so trendy to fry or bake your Tommy Toes with the stem on.
I am not crazy for tomato sauce or Passata. I like to count out my small tomatoes into each dish. That's seeds and skin too. With these small ones I appreciate the sweet and tangy taste you can measure with plop plop into a dish.
As for the dried ones...in our house they don't last very long because there are so many excuses to eat them. In the fridge they are a temptation while they last.
Because the dried ones have a richer flavour I don't add them to stews. They go well alone on a tortilla with extras or on pizza...or in things like polenta, rice and millet dishes. Great in salads too. With cheese, they excel. They make a great excuse for pasta salads with a simple Balsamic vinaigrette.
If you stew them in olive oil you can get a flavour zing for anthing else you may add for frying.
I freeze mine too. When I get a full bag, tomato pasta sauce here we come.
Thanks for sharing Dave. So you only freeze the toms after picking and they are for cooking later on for sauce etc.
You also pick and dry them straight away while fresh. These dehydrated toms go into olive oil to keep. How long do you think the jars of oiled toms will last?
Note:I did not wash them.
The result is that they will freeze without sticking to one another.
You don't want to harvest after rain, watering or too early in the morning. Separated, it is easy to select the number of toms you need each time for cooking.
When I dry batches, I always halve them or prick and squeeze the very small ones before laying them in the dryer.
Then, as I have pointed out, I dipped them when dried in Balsamic Vinegar and drown them tightly into olive oil filled jars before refrigerating them.
Excuse me while I go outback and harvest some more.