Oven-dried tomatoes

I have a love-hate relationship with summer.  

On one hand I enjoy wearing summer dresses, walking barefoot (I hate shoes), and early summer camping .... oh, wait, I enjoy late summer camping as well - as long as there are not too many people.  

On the other hand, I dislike the heat, the humidity, and mosquitos (they are always after me).  I also tend to lose my appetite in hot weather so throughout the months of June, July, and most of August I eat tons of salads.

This year I am trying to make my salads more exciting by adding flavorful ingredients and mixing new dressings.    Oven-dried tomatoes make any simple salad exciting.  They are also great in sandwiches, on pasta, or just on their own.  Make a big batch 'cause they tend to disappear fast ;)

There is no "correct" way of making oven-dried tomatoes.  A simple Google search will reveal tons of recipes, so read through a couple or choose one as a guideline and experiment!

What you need:

6 tomatoes

3-4 garlic cloves, crushed

3-4 springs of thyme or a small bunch of basil (or use both) minced.  Plus another couple of branches, whole

about 2 tbsp olive oil 

1 tsp salt

1 tsp sugar

fresh ground pepper

 What to do:

• Preheat oven to 350F (175 C)
• To begin with, you will need to peel the tomatoes.

• Bring a big pot of water to boil.  Meanwhile make an "x" cut on the top of tomatoes

• Immerse tomatoes in boiling water for less than a minute.  You do not want them to cook.  If you are doing it right, you'll notice the skin slightly peeling off next to the x-cut.

• Put tomatoes in a bowl with icy-cold water (to stop cooking process) and then peel off  the skin.
• Cut tomatoes in 6 or 8 and remove seeds.

   

• Toss tomatoes with oil, salt, sugar, pepper, minced herbs, and crushed garlic.
• Add sugar and salt gradually, starting with 1/2 of teaspoon - depending on the sweetness of tomatoes and your personal taste you might need less (or more) seasoning.
• Don't hesitate to taste and adjust the flavoring.

• You can use these marinated raw tomatoes or go ahead and roast/dry them.
• Arrange tomatoe-herb-garlic "mix" on a baking sheet.  If tomatoes gave a lot of juice, leave it out.  Add thyme/basilic springs and roast for an hour or so.
• Alternatively, you can dry tomatoes at lower temperature for 3-4 hours or even overnight.  It will depend on the juiciness of the fruit and your oven settings.  
• Slow-roasted tomatoes have deeper flavor, but believe me, the fast-roasted are delicious as well.

• Once tomatoes are "dry enough" (anywhere from lightly shriveled to light brown), remove the sheet from the oven and let it cool down completely.
• Store tomatoes (without garlic) in jars filled with olive oil, in a fridge.  Drier tomatoes will last longer, juicier ones should be consumed within a week or two.
  

Tips and Suggestions:  

This is a great way to save extra tomatoes or to use those that are not very sweet/ripe.

Spiced Chickpea and Tomato Soup

Another Martha Stewart recipe:

Image from Martha Stewart

3 garlic cloves, minced

3 dried hot red chilies, chopped or 1/2 tsp red-pepper flakes

1 tsp ground coriander

3/4 tsp coarse salt

1/8 tsp caraway seeds

2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

1 can (15oz) chickpeas, drained and rinsed

1 1/2 cups crushed canned tomatoes with juice

1/2 cup drained jarred roasted peppers, rinsed

3 1/2 cup vegetable stock

Parsley for garnish

• Using the mortar and pestle crush garlic, chilies, coriander, salt, and caraway to form a paste
• Heat oil in a saucepan; add garlic mixture and cook until just softened, for about 3 minutes
• Stir in chickpeas, tomatoes, roasted peppers, and stock. Simmer, stirring often for 15 minutes.
• Pure soup, rewarm if necessary. Serve with a dollop of vegan sour cream and spring of parsley.

Makes 6 cups.

Gazpacho

I have been fascinated by the idea of a cold soup for a while, however every time the mercury rises I loose my appetite completely and a mare thought of a soup (cold or hot for that matter) makes me ..... let just say not very happy.

Yesterday was not too hot and after overeating during my trip to Toronto I decided to cook something fast, simple, and light. I browsed several recipe sites to get an idea of what I can put in my gazpacho. I have to admit that I have never had gazpacho before. Probably there are rules and regulations on what you can put and what you can not but I just went with my appetite and taste to make this:

GAZPACHO

6 medium-size tomatoes
1 red bell pepper
2 small cucumbers (they are sold here as Lebanese). If you don't have small cucumbers use the regular ones
2 garlic cloves
2 purple shallots (I know those are rare to find. Do not hesitate to use either purple onion (1/2 or even 1/4 should be enough) or regular shallots)
1 tsp of ground cumin
1 ripe avocado
3 cups of vegetable juice (I used V8)
1 tsp sherry vinegar (you can use lemon juice instead or even white balsamic vinegar)
5-7 springs of cilantro
Pinch of sugar
Salt and pepper

Peel tomatoes. To do so, make an x-shaped cut on the bottom of each tomato. Put them in a sauce-pan and cover with boiling hot water. Wait for 2-3 minutes. You will notice that the skin next to the cut is peeling off and all you have to do is remove tomatoes (careful not to burn yourself) and peel off the rest of the skin.


Coarsely chop the pepper, cucumbers, onions, and garlic. Combine them with tomatoes in a big soup pot.
Using hand-held blender, blend vegetables until smooth. You can also use a regular blender for this purpose.
Add cumin, vinegar, sugar, cilantro, and avocado. Blend until smooth.
Add V8. I would recommend adding it slowly and mixing throughout to give the soup required consistency. Also try the soup to adjust for seasoning.

Feel free to experiment with different herbs and spices. You might want to check out this website for some unsual Gazpachos, such as Oriental or White Gazpachos.


P.S. The picture of purple shallots comes from the Muffintop blog

Pizza and Pasta

To continue my Italian weekend I made pizza (again). I followed the recipe posted earlier with one slight modification: for the yest I added the whole packet instead of 1/2 tbsp. I liked the texture of the dough better.

For the toppings I made a smooth tomato sauce (just blended the "chunky" sauce) and added some roasted garlic paste to it, olive spread, pepper, red onion, mushrooms, sun dried tomatoes, roasted red peppers, "cheese", and capers.

I had so many vegetables left that on Monday I made


Big Red Pasta Sauce.

1 can of diced tomatoes (preferable with garlic and spices)
3-4 garlic cloves, minced
1 small onion, chopped
1/2 pepper, cubed
1 medium size zucchini, sliced
Mushrooms (the more the merrier), sliced
Sun dried tomatoes
Spices (lots, and lots, and lots)
1 cup of red vine (optional)
2 roasted peppers
Canned artichokes (I had half a can left from the risotto)
Pinch of sugar
Capers
Vegan Parmesan
Olive oil

Saute the onion and garlic for couple of minutes. Add mushrooms, zucchinis, pepper, dried spices, vine, sun dried tomatoes, and cook for 5 minutes. Add the canned tomatoes, pinch of sugar, bring to boil, lower the heat and simmer for 10-15 minutes.

After I added roasted peppers and artichokes, cooked it for another 5 minutes, and served it over whole wheat spaghetti, sprinkled with vegan Parmesan, capers, and basil accompanied by a glass of "Pater" - mmmmmmmm ;)