Red red red.
I started my tomato-harvest adventure with my slicing tomatoes, as my paste tomatoes were not yet ripe. (I will never be able to make that statement again. The paste tomatoes are legion, they are ripening, they will never end.) I picked pounds of Brandywine tomatoes, weighing over a pound each, and the more delicately-sized and more deeply-colored Moskvich. Both heirlooms, both “tall vine” and both seed packets purchased from Johnny’s Selected Seeds in Maine.
I’ve eaten both varieties out of hand, and pray that their incredible flavor will translate to the processed product. I was anticipating returning campers, and so wanted to put up a tomato sauce base, rather than “simply” (ha) canning the cut tomatoes. This would allow me to serve a dinner with a minimum of effort but a maximum of impact. Ta da! Mom’s tomatoes over pasta!
So I started the process, which begins with boiling water, a bowl of ice, a cutting board with sharp knife nearby, and time.
A large saucepan, and still only two Brandywines fit in at one time.
Less than a minute in that hot-water bath, and the peel loosened. Time for part two:
Look behind the bowl of already-peeled Brandywines. They go right from the boiling water into a bowl of ice water. The shock loosens the peel.
Cut out the core. Cut out any bruised or less-than-perfect spots.
The peel slips off so easily with this technique. I wish everything else in Life happened this smoothly.
After the newness of prepping tomatoes for cooking, making them into sauce seems hardly worth mentioning. Except...I'm mighty proud of those 6 tubs of sauce.
And so the frozen tomato sauce rests in the bottom drawer of my freezer. Added during the cooking process: garlic, basil and parsley, all from my garden, sauteed in extra virgin olive oil. I now have the foundation of 6 dinners. I can added ground beef, cooked sausage, or chopped steamed vegetables. I can spoon this sauce over pasta or elegant quinoa. I will feed my family.
I look forward the praise I will almost certainly receive.
WORDS FROM OTHERS
“Drowning in good tomatoes is the exclusive privilege of the gardener and farm-market shopper. The domain of excess is rarely the lot of country people, so we’ll take this one when we get it. From winter I always look back on a season of bountiful garden tomatoes and never regret having eaten a single one.”
— Barbara Kingsolver, “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle”
In Montana, a cool summer has meant that we are just starting to get the first ripe tomatos. It may not be a year to put many tomatos in the freezer, but we’re still eating lettuce in mid-August! Olivia is on the plane home, and I let her know this morning that she’d be coming home to lots of tomatos. We already miss her!
I know she misses you all, too, very much. This has been such a rich, rewarding summer for her, and Will and I are so very grateful for your generosity. I cannot wait to see her photos and hear the details of her adventures! I will write you a proper note in a day or two —
Will and I, and probably Justine, will be at LaGuardia when she lands at 11:35 p.m. If all goes well, we’ll be home by 1:30 a.m.
I hope your cool summer moves in to a warm, extended fall, so that you receive your full complement of tomatoes! My lettuce bolted a few weeks ago, and I need to re-seed. I’m hoping to have fresh lettuce again next month — amazing how quickly you get snooty in the grocery store. “Oh, that lettuce is un-WORTHY.” I hope Olivia is pleased at the heap of fruit on our kitchen table.
I’ll send you an email when we have her back home safe.
Amy,
You have been doing so much growing and putting by that I don’t know how you’re finding time in harvest season to maintain this blog so beautifully! I love it, and I’m sending it to my other best gardener friend, Alana Balogh. You two will inspire each other!
Tell me about the art at the top of your blog, please —
It’s gorgeous.
love
Wren, who just finished the last of the basil and parsley from our Roundtable day YUM.
Thank you, Wren — I am so pleased you approve of this. My writing a blog was your idea, after all! It has become my solace as well as a happy activity, despite the effort. Actually, loading and sizing the photos is proving to be the toughest part for me. But I’m learning. And thanks, too, for passing it on! Does Alana have a gardening blog?
About the photo/art at the top: Will spent a long, very hot morning with me in the gardening, directing. He loves to direct. “Bend forward, tip your head, move your hand, drop your tusch,” that last being the most critical direction. Then, he did me the ultimate favor of blurring me with some photoshop technique. I asked him how to explain it to you and he replied:
You could tell her I modified it using a PhotoShop filter — Pastels, I believe.
And Wren, come back anytime for parsley, basil, chard, kale, potatoes, peppers, dill, cherry tomatoes, paste/slicing tomatoes….! xoxox, Amy