Blushing tomatoes!

I am not a vegetarian, I like a variety of meats entirely too much to give it up. I do however have a pretty high need for fresh vegetables. Spring, Summer and the warmer parts of Fall I eat salads for lunch and dinner. These are not wimpy salads mind you, and occasionally can be adorn with shrimp, tuna, chicken, ham or steak (only if there was left overs!). I actually find if I am not getting enough vegetables I start to get cranky towards the end of the week. Mostly I think because on the inside I am not feeling the greatest. Now combine a need for vegetables with a very frugal grocery shopper and mix in a little I never make shopping lists and there can be some times when I over buy vegetables and they don't get eaten before they start losing the appeal. I really hate wasting food in this way so I try to find ways to salvage what  I can. If vegetables are too far gone they definitely can still be added to soups (please don't add moldy or fully rotten vegetables to food those do need to be thrown away). If they are getting a bit more scary they can be trimmed and thrown in a pot and turned into vegetable stock. There are some vegetables though that don't work in making stock. Tomatoes are one of these items. Now larger tomatoes I flash cook in boiling water and freeze. Then when making pasta sauce or something else I can toss them in. This however is not the best way of salvaging grape or cherry tomatoes! Stumbling through one of my Nigella cookbooks I happened upon a wonderful recipe called Moonblush Tomatoes. They are softer than sun dried tomatoes and in my opinion much tastier!

fresh grape tomatoes

 

Wrinkly tomatoes that need salvaging!

Nigella's Moon Blushed Tomatoes

I tried the recipe for the first time at least 5  years ago and fell in love. And since I view having tomatoes a staple in my kitchen (at least while I am in Sunshine Ville!). I, of course being the recipe tweak-er, owning primarily from being too impatient to follow directions exactly and often being too lazy to go get the appropriate ingredients (although for these all ingredients should already be in your kitchen!), have never made these the same way twice, but have loved them each iteration. owning primarily from being too impatient to follow directions exactly and often being too lazy to go get the appropriate ingredients (although for these all ingredients should already be in your kitchen!).

Here's what you do:

Preheat oven to 450 F (make sure the oven gets fully to 450 F!)

Cut tomatoes in half and set them cut side up in a oven proof dish (I to reduce clean up will line the dish with foil)

Drizzle olive oil (2 Tbs), Kosher salt (2 tsp), dried thyme (1 tsp) and sugar (1/4 tsp) on the tomatoes.

Put tomatoes in the oven and turn it off. Leave tomatoes in the oven overnight without opening it (if you need to peak please do it through the little window!)

And here are some of my tweaks!

Oven temp: If I want them more dehydrated I actually heat the oven to 500 F (instead of 450 F).

Cutting the Tomatoes: I have cut them both the short and long way, cutting them the long way makes it easier for them to stand up in the baking dish. However it also means that some of the seed gloop may not dry out as much in the oven

Leave out the sugar - I haven't tried them with the sugar and so maybe I am missing something, but I am not sure what the purpose of the sugar is and I don't like things sweet.

Additions: sprinkling garlic salt on them or fresh ground pepper adds some additional flavor. Add what ever herbs and spices you tastes desire. My next tweak will be drizzling them with Balsamic Vinegar!

Larger tomatoes - so I have tried tweaking the entire recipe for larger variety tomatoes but with limited success. The problem lies in trying to dry the tomatoes out in the oven (not about to go buy a dehydrator which would do the trick I know!). If I do happen upon a solution I will be sure to let you all know.

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Use these blushing tomatoes on pizza, in salads, on top of tomato soup, in other soups, in quiches, in omelettes, in lasagna, with pasta, with cheese and crackers or basil or just eat them plain. They are amazing and a great way to avoid throwing away food!