Tomatoes
How to harvest, clean, store, prepare/cook/eat and preserve!
HARVEST: We grow several varieties of slicing, Roma/pasta and cherry tomatoes. Some are red when ripe, others are yellow or orange when ripe. Tomatoes are simple to pick. For slicing and Roma/paste tomatoes, you choose your tomato (green will stay green, blush or turning color will ripen on the counter in your kitchen in a few days and full yellow, orange or red, depending on variety, are ready to enjoy right away!), and snip off the stem from the plant. For cherry tomatoes, you can snip them off the plant like you would the bigger guys or you can simply use your hand and gently pull the tomato off the stem.
CLEAN AND STORE: Tomatoes are super easy to clean and store! All you need to do is rinse them under cool, clean water and place them on the counter. You can pop them in the fridge (be aware of the controversy around this though!), but some people feel is makes the tomato develop a “mealy” texture that is undesirable.
PREPARE/COOK/EAT: Here are a few options….pop them in your mouth and enjoy the taste of summer or place them on a platter with basil leaves and fresh mozzarella with balsamic vinegar drizzled on top and eat. to cook them in a dish… Bring salted water to a boil and cook some linguini. While the pasta is cooking, slice tomatoes in large chunks (for cherry tomatoes, just slice in half) and place in a pan with some olive oil. Cook over medium heat until they warm through and the juice begins to reduce. Add some olives (both Spanish and Calamata sliced in half) and artichoke hearts, gently combine and heat through. Just before removing from heat, add two cloves of minced garlic. Add the drained pasta and combine. Serve with fresh parm cheese (if desired).
PRESERVE: If you picked so many tomatoes you're up to your eyeballs in them, you can simply place them whole, or cut in freezer bags until you're ready to use for sauce, juicing, soup, chili, etc. You can whip up a giant batch of spaghetti sauce and pressure can it so you have a summer flavor waiting on the shelf deep into the colder months. you can dehydrate or freeze dry them for crunchy snacks.
