5 Tasty Ways to Use Your Surplus of Tomatoes
The rainy days of fall are starting to trickle in, but there’s still a good chance that you’ve got more of the savory, vitamin C-rich fruit than you know what to do with. You can only eat so many tomato salads, after all. Since we absolutely hate it when good food accidentally goes to waste (and we bet you do, too), we’ve decided to offer some inspiration for how to finish off your stockpile of nightshades before they begin to fade.
- SALSA
You only need a handful of ingredients (and some elbow grease) to turn a pile of homegrown tomatoes into a pot of scorchin’ salsa. Eat it fresh on, well, everything or can it to hold you over until next year’s crop.
- SAUCE
Again, you have the option of fresh or for later. Which you choose may depend on how many tomatoes you actually have: If your haul is around five pounds, consider cooking fresh sauce and freezing the surplus. If you’ve got closer to 20 pounds, canning may be the way to go, as you can store your sauce in the pantry for about a year without worrying about it going off.
- KETCHUP
The ingredients in store-bought ketchup aren’t always of the garden variety. If you happen to have a ton of tomatoes, consider making your own. You can control exactly what goes in there and tweak your recipe to suit your taste. The best part is, it’s super easy — you just need to set aside a solid chunk of time for cooking.
- TOMATO JAM
True jam lovers put all kinds of wacky things into jam (and put jam on all kinds of things). Tomato jam actually isn’t that wacky, though, given that tomatoes are a fruit and can be quite sweet when ripe. A couple of pounds of tomatoes and a couple of hours of slow cooking will yield a complex, versatile jam that you may not have tried before.
Photo Source: Kitchen Konfidence
5. TOMATO SOUP
Homemade beats pre-packaged just about every time — especially when it comes to food — and
homemade tomato soup is no exception. With just over a half hour of kitchen time, you can have rich tomato soup (made from real ingredients) to warm you up on cool nights or pair with your famous grilled cheese. Be sure to make extra and freeze it for quick, nutritious meals over the coming months.
