Some of the tomatoes are almost perfect. Almost totally unblemished. Most of them, however, have some kind of blemish or another. No matter. It's organic gardening, without fertilizers or pesticides. The one on the left is a beefsteak tomato, I believe. I brought seeds back from North Carolina.
Remember, Walt grew a lot of tomato plants in the spring and transplanted just 30 of them into the vegetable garden. On the left is a photo to give you an idea how many we are harvesting. And the harvest is really just getting underway. (We are also still harvesting a lot of summer squashes.)
Here's the sauce pot. All it has in it is tomatoes and coarse salt (gros sel). After I took the picture, Walt added oregano and bay leaves, all from the garden. And probably some black pepper. Then you just turn it on and let the tomatoes disintegrate. After their liquid has boiled down, you run the tomatoes through a food mill to remove the skins and seeds.
And before you put them in the pot, you trim them up. The tops and of course the green stems just go into the compost, which will help feed next year's crop. We'll put the sauce in plastic containers and keep them in the freezer for our cooking needs and desires this winter.
Voilà. Isn't simple food the best food most of the time? And don't worry, we're eating plenty of fresh tomatoes right now. But it's good to plan for the future.
Tomatoes are one of my favorite fruits. Right now I'm having a feast on them, but, unfortunately, they are not home grown but store bought. In any case, they are so much better than the tasteless kind you find in supermarkets in the U.S. However, those you can find in farmer's markets, there, are not that bad.
ReplyDeleteAnd what about your red kidney beans?
DeleteBeautiful photos and agreed on the approach to sauce making!
ReplyDeleteDo you ever think of keeping chickens?
I've mentioned it but Walt is against it. He's probably right. Having chickens ties you down more than having a dog. You can't load the chickens into the car and take off for 3 or 4 days.
DeleteI still can't get over how many of those cute round squash you have this year. The sauce is worth the trouble.
ReplyDeleteI saw some pretty round green squash at SuperU yesterday morning. If we didn't have the yellow ones and also a lot of regular zucchini, I would have bought some. They were selling for about 50 cents a pound.
DeleteI am so jealous! The only thing I have had any luck with are bell and hot peppers this summer. I have plenty of hot pepper vinegar for collards and oysters! I always have good luck with cherry tomatoes in containers and even those failed me this year. It seems the wooded areas around me have become a nursery for a couple of does to raise their fawns. They demolished everything I was trying to grow this summer including my flowers. They don’t seem to care for my zinnias though! I suppose I am going to have to fence in an area next year or just forget it!
ReplyDeleteWhen we moved here in 2003, over that first summer we saw deer grazing in our yard frequently. So we had the whole yard fenced in, which kept the dog in and the deer out. So we don't have a deer problem any more, and we've had a warm-enough and dry-enough summer for the tomatoes to do really well. I was just out there with the dog and a flashlight, and there are literally hundreds of tomatoes on the plants, many of which are close to being ripe.
DeleteOh my heavens, I know that sauce will be sooooo delicious!
ReplyDeleteJudy
Such beautiful vegetables! I'm jealous of all your tomatoes. We have a large garden, but didn't have much luck with our tomatoes. I think California has been too hot all summer, and the tomatoes suffered. We're getting lots of summer squash, though....too much.
ReplyDeleteI know what you mean about summer squash being too much of a good thing. Sorry about the California tomato situation.
DeleteI love the look of those little lemon squashes. Do they taste lemony, or is it just the name?
ReplyDeleteAnd the tomatoes and basil, oh my.
No those lemon squash don't taste lemony. They just look a little like lemons. I cooked those yesterday.
DeleteJust by coincidence I saw in my newspaper a few minutes ago a recipe for a salad of mixed tomato types:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/aug/28/green-red-tomato-salad-recipe-anna-jones-modern-cook