Sun-Dried Tomato
A gazillion tomato on the counter, and a rainy day. I don't have it in me to go look at flooding in my basement, so, I will do some cooking, instead.
To make 'Sun-Dried' Tomato, I need very little: • a few pounds of tomato • a decent sea salt, which for me and cooking, is Pink Himalayan Sea Salt. • oven at 200º F (93ºC) • time.... as much as it takes. For the amount I have, I am guessing 4 to 6 hours
AFTER drying, I will put them up in jars: • one, with just the tomato, and some Olive Oil. • one, with some thyme and oregano
To START:
I used the big basket, top right, and the 4 darker tomato, bottom left, for the sun-dried.
Above A few of the larger tomato, are bigger than two large fists combined. The largest weighs in at 1 pound, 11 ounces (765 grams)!
Below After slicing, arrange on a sheet tray. I filled 2 Quarter Hotel Sheet trays and 2 Half Hotel Sheet trays. (image is a quarter sheet tray)
Above Slice and Core... take out the stem and the rough core. Arrange neatly skin side down, trying not to overlap the bits.
Above Next up, is a sprinkling of Pink Himalayan Sea Salt. The salt helps season, as well as draw out the moisture. AND, the whole goal of Sun-Dried, is to pull moisture out, dry them and let the sweetness concentrate. Tomato really are sweet.
Below All four hotel trays are loaded and salted, as well as arranged for drying. Into the oven they go, and I will check randomly, starting at 3 hours... I suspect final time will be 200º at 4 hours. Although, new oven, so no real idea, this time around.
Above A pot of boiling water, to sterilize the jars, and one to sterilize the rings and lids!
Below Jars are out, and ready
Above the FIRST TRAY is DONE!
Above I add a sliver of garlic clove, in each jar! Some jars will get some Thyme from the garden, some not.
Below Last season, I grew some Mediterranean Greek Oregano, and dried it over winter: So, a few pinches of that, in the jar, too!
Above Fill with slices of sun-dried Tomato, pressing with a fork, to get all the air bubbles out. I add a little olive oil and a little tomato at a time. Midway thru the jar, I add another pinch of Oregano.
Below Last sheet tray is out of the oven. these were the beefsteak tomato. Bright red, to begin with. not the purple-red that the other three trays were.
Above Last step in the cooking, is to let each sealed, closed jar, when filled, spend 10 minutes in a boil, to sterilize, again.
Above I noticed, no other Hivers, who spend time, making food and recipes, do this, so, I thought I would remind everyone: CLEAN AS YOU GO! Keep your kitchen clean... it's not rocket surgery.
I sampled a few slices, as they came out of the oven. My, my my... these are So SWEET!
