Source
r/gardening•
reddeb

20+ pounds of gorgeous, large cherry tomatoes! Any ideas?

The coolest part is that I didn't even plant them. My best guess is that a bird brought the seed into the garden. I have a 450 sq ft organic garden, grow several varieties of heirloom tomatoes. This plant just sprouted and showed up one day, I don't even buy cherry tomatoes, have no clue where it came from. It's not even growing near my other tomatoes. I've been using my own seeds for a couple of years so it can't be a instance of wrong seed in a packet.

Anyway, I've got oodles of cherry tomatoes, any good recipe ideas?

Posted Jun 21, 2010, 2:08 AM UTC

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daveinacave•

Hey, fun. Maybe you could try your hand at canning them (or cooking them into a sauce and canning that) or track down a food bank and donate them. If you go the food bank route, don't wait around b/c sometimes that food sits there for a couple of days before it's given to the public. Here's a list of food bank resources

2
reddebOP•

I do a lot of volunteer work for a food bank. Food banks can't accept home grown food.

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daveinacave•

Maybe yours doesn't, but I volunteer for two that do :P People mostly go to food banks for packaged and processed pseudo-food so who knows, maybe it's a waste of time.

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reddebOP•

Could depend on local regulations. Here they cannot accept fresh or home grown food for donation but they still give away fresh fruits, vegetables and meat. The food bank must purchase those items from donated funds.

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goonmaster•

You could dehydrate them and store in freezer for winter. If you're buying a food dehydrator make sure you test it before purchasing it because sometimes they can be very noisy.

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reddebOP•

I don't have a dehydrator nor was I planning to purchase one anytime soon but I do have a smoker. Since I make beef jerky in the smoker I wonder if it would be the same concept to dehydrate tomatoes. I could use the smoker without wood, it takes propane. Think I'll do a bit of research on this.

Thanks!

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nonethewiser•

Dried cherry tomatoes have an awesome flavor, much more tart than dried roma tomatoes.

I love crushed cherry tomatoes with mozzarella and basil in olive oil.

They make a good pizza sauce, if you really like that flavor (I do).

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reddebOP•

The thing is, for canning I would have to remove all the skins. That's a lot of blanching and peeling. I'm considering making a fresh salsa and possibly dehydrating. There are hundreds more that will be ripe in the coming days and that's not including my large, heirloom tomatoes which are better for canning and in sauces. Just wasn't sure what to do with such a vast quantity of cherry tomatoes as I've never grown them before.

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nonethewiser•

You want my address? :)

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reddebOP•

Sure!

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boinkit•

There are tools/strainers for removing the skins from the sauce.

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[deleted]•

I'd dry them for roughly 24 hours in the dehydrator so they became extra flavorful then crush them with some basil, garlic, mozzarella, and olive oil to put on my favorite type of pasta or some quinoa. No cooking required except for the noodles/quinoa, awesome on a sunny evening with some salad and garlic bread. maannnn I want that

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reddebOP•

I'm going to research if I can use my smoker for drying.

Thanks!

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[deleted]•

If it's a hot smoker, it will dry. That's actually an incredible idea! Thanks for putting it out there.

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reddebOP•

I made an amazing salsa today. Kids went crazy for it, even my Mexican ex-husband loved it and asked if he could take some. I used all of the cherry tomatoes I had already picked (there are still hundreds on the vine) cilantro from the garden, onion and chipotle peppers. A major winner that I will keep making. There are so many tomatoes I will definitely experiment with smoking/dehydrating them as well.

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reddebOP•

I have a great smoker, can get upto 500 degrees F. I'm going to do more research when I get home, I'm on my phone right now.

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ChipotleSalad•

You might be interested in this: Smoke-Dried Tomatoes

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bluehelios•

Not tomatoes .... but mushrooms in a smoker are great. They can be pureed and frozen in small quantities to add smokey flavor to anything later on without all the work.

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reddebOP•

But I'm not growing mushrooms...

I did smoke a bunch of cherry tomatoes. I may have left them in the smoker too long, instead of chewy they mostly came out crispy. But fabulous. Really tastie. I've been dipping them in cream cheese, yummy!

I've also made an amazing salsa with the cherry tomatoes and a huge pot of marinara with the heirlooms. Really impressed the kids with the marinara, my oldest actually asked me how I made it.

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boinkit•

Either eat them fresh or make sauce.

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reddebOP•

Way too massive a quantity to either eat fresh or in a sauce. And there are 5 of us.

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boinkit•

Make sauce. Freeze in freezer bags. Use as needed.

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groxie•

Make heaps of slow-roasted tomatoes that you can store in the fridge and continue to use to make everything delicious all summer. Seriously one of the most delicious things ever - you'll make all of your friends and neighbors love you forever if you share.

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reddebOP•

Thanks so much!

To start, I made an amazing salsa today. Kids went crazy for it, even my Mexican ex-husband loved it and asked if he could take some. I used all of the cherry tomatoes I had already picked (there are still hundreds on the vine) cilantro from the garden, onion and chipotle peppers. A major winner that I will keep making. There are so many tomatoes I will definitely experiment with smoking/dehydrating them as well.

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idwolf•

Large cherry tomatoes? Are they oblong like romas?

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reddebOP•

Nope. They are perfectly round, like slightly small compari tomatoes. They seem to definitely be cherry tomatoes. Very sweet. I picked more than another 20lbs today. I'm going to try smoking them tomorrow. I looked up the how to and it said I have to halve and seed them and I ran out of time after washing them, so it will be tomorrow. I also have a bunch of large heirloom tomatoes that are ripe right now, hundreds more that are green and hundreds of tear drop tomatoes that are green.

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idwolf•

Guinness world record for the largest salad? :D

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