If you can stand one more tomato post, this sauce is pretty awesome. It’s also easy, which makes it an instant favourite for me. I’ve been making large batches of this and storing it in 3-4 cup servings in baggies in the freezer.
All you need is a pile of ripe tomatoes, a few onions, some garlic, basil and whatever vegetables you can pull from the garden that would taste good in a sauce. I used green pepper, zucchini and carrots (which add a bit of natural sweetness after it has been roasted). In one pan I also added a jalapeno pepper – just one mind you – and I had to label that batch “spicy” before it went in the freezer. Apparently the drought in the earlier part of the summer has made them particularly hot this year. And I mean really hot. My hands burned all night and again all day today after chopping some for the freezer yesterday.
You might also want a G&T or two, if you have already been chopping, slicing and dicing in the kitchen all day. Make them doubles, you probably deserve it. But wait until after you put the knife down. And the camera. Notice the slightly crooked picture above?
Roasted Tomato and Garden Vegetable Sauce
- a whole pile of tomatoes
- onions (about 2 per roasting pan), quartered
- zucchini (I added 2 small ones, chopped in large pieces)
- 5-6 garlic cloves per roasting pan
- carrots (1-2 large carrots per roasting pan)
- basil (a handful)
- salt and pepper
- balsamic vinegar
- olive oil
Preheat oven to 400F. Wash, core and quarter tomatoes and add to roasting pan along with the other vegetables. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and drizzle with generous amounts of balsamic and olive oil. Roast for 1 – 1 1/2 hours, or until it looks done. You can fit more than one pan at a time in the oven, just rotate them once during baking time to make sure they all cook evenly. Once done, allow it to cool, then transfer the contents (liquid and all) to a food processor and puree until smooth.
I can’t make any promises, but I hope to get away from the subject of tomatoes for a while. Hopefully I’ll find a new distraction.
Linked to Frugally Sustainable, Gastronomical Sovereignty, Live Renewed, GNOWFGLINS, White Wolf Summit Farmgirl, A Pinch of Joy, Growing Home, An Oregon Cottage
