Tomato Stock

Tomatoes yield very little waste when processed.  The reason for this is the entire tomato can be used.   The pulp can be used in sauces, chutneys and salsas, the skins can be dried for tomato powder and the natural juice that is released can be used for stock.  Tomatoes contain high levels of the enzyme pectase (pectinerterase) that is activated when tomatoes are cut.  This results in separation of the pulp and juice in home canned tomatoes.  The enzyme is destroyed at temperatures over 180ºF (82ºC).  Using this knowledge it is possible to force tomatoes to separate in order to make two products, one from the pulp and the other from the separated juice.

Removing the juice from the pulp results in a thicker pulp that takes less time to boil down to the desired consistency for sauces, ketchups and paste.  Reserving that liquid to can as tomato stock puts one more product on your pantry shelves but once you have tried it you will see why I rave a little about it.  It has a lovely, mellow flavour.  Tomato stock gives an amazing flavour to roast beef during cooking and to the resulting gravy.  The stock is also wonderful added to soups or stews as well as using as the liquid for cooking rice or pasta. 

Each hamper of tomatoes will give a yield of about 20 - 250 ml (half-pints) of tomato stock.  This particular hamper was processed into two sauces, one that did not have the juice removed so I ended up with 10 half-pints.  Every time I make a sauce where the tomato juice can be separated from the pulp I do.  I'd like to finish the season with 60 - 250 ml (half-pint) jars of tomato stock for the upcoming year.  I'm using half pints because I prefer that size.  It is the perfect amount for adding to roasts and stews.  The tomato stock can be processed in 500 ml (pints) jars as well as L jars.  I process at 10 lb pressure for 15 minutes.

Second Annual He Said/Shed Said Contest Summary

Earlier this month I announced the Second Annual He Said/She Said Contest. The focus of this year's contest was Company's Coming Heart-Friendly Cooking by Jean Paré, one of my favourite cookbook authors. Originally the contest was designed to have 4 recipes from this cookbook each for a total of 8 recipes made during the month of August. As luck would have it or simply bad timing life managed to get in the way so we ended up with 3 recipes each resulting in a total of 6 recipes. Of the 6 recipes 4 were definite keepers.  Don't worry as there are still a lot of great recipes in this book that we will be trying and I will be blogging about them as well.  Click on any of the pictures to take you to the recipe.  It would be great to hear the feedback as to which recipe you liked the most. 

Kitchen Quick Tip - Freezing Mashed Vegetables

Freeze cooked mashed vegetables (carrots, squash, turnips, potatoes, etc) in muffin tins for individual serving sizes later.  When frozen empty the muffin tin of vegetables into a zipper style freezer bag for easy use.

Spaghetti Sauce

By far our favourite spaghetti sauce is my home made meat sauce but next to that is roasted tomato sauce.  The last couple of years I have been canning a plainer tomato sauce that captures some of the flavours of the meat sauce but without the meat.  Seasoned with my organically, home grown herbs it has a lovely flavour and smooth texture.  It is a versatile, mildly flavoured sauce that can be used for pasta, cabbage rolls or in any dish where you would use a tomato based pasta sauce.

A food strainer is a must when canning the amount of tomatoes I do.  It makes quick work of removing seeds and skins leaving a nice smooth puree to work with.  Foods can be strained before or after cooking.  In most cases I strain tomatoes before making them into sauces although there are a couple f tomato products I strain after cooking.

I have a manual food strainer that I set up indoors or outside depending on the weather.  Last year I splurged on the KitchenAid® food strainer attachment.  The manual food strainer is more work but it is quite portable so I can set it up where I want.  The KitchenAid® food strainer attachment is a lot less work and it gives a smoother product.  The only real complaint that I have is the hopper is too small but there is an additional tray available that extends the hopper to hold more food.  The second problem with the KitchenAid® food strainer is the set-up.  Being short I have to stand on a stool to reach the hopper but that isn't KitchenAid®'s fault that is my parents for not giving me genes for a higher stature.

I used a full hamper (5/8 bushel) to make this spaghetti sauce.  The tomatoes really would have been a bit of a pain to peel although they were a nice size for canning whole tomatoes.  Running the first hamper through the food mill was an easy start to the tomato canning season.

I canned the sauce rather late in the evening while entertaining.  Well actually my husband was entertaining and I just did the food while canning.  I had strained the tomatoes the day before so all I had to do was put the sauce together and cook it.  I do think it looks gorgeous in the jars but then I'm a bit biased.  When making this tomato sauce reserve the skins and seeds for tomato powder and let drain to can up the excess liquid to make tomato stock.