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[WitchHazel]

We make loads and loads of this over the summer. Some we eat immediately, the rest is frozen and used during the rest of the year,

 

Traditionally it's made with plum tomatoes, but we've found that any homegrown tomato will make a good sauce. I wouldn't recommend using shop bought tomatoes to make this, as they just don't have the strength of flavour needed to make a good passata.

 

Here's what we do (this is my husbands method).

 

MAKING THE PASSATA

 

Preheat oven to about gas mark 3 or 4.

 

Cut your tomatoes in half, and place them cut side up into a large baking tin. We pack the tin tightly. Some days we have so many kilos of tomatoes, that we have three large trays on the go.

 

Sprinkle a little salt and pepper over the top, we also like to spread around a little crushed or chopped garlic. Drizzle a very small amount of olive oiil over the top, and put in the oven to cook. This takes about 30-45 mins.

 

When cooked we take them out of the oven and let them cool slightly, then drain of the liquid. This liquid can be useful, I'll explain more later.

 

We then pass the tomatoes through a passata machine. We bough ours from seedsofitaly, but they are on holiday at the moment. You can get one very cheaply from Lakeland limitied here http://www.lakeland.co.uk/tomato-master/F/keyword/tomato/product/12165

 

This wonderful machine pulps the tomatoes, spitting the skins out of the sude (into a bowl).

 

The resulting pulp is the passata. We freeze this in 450-500ml amounts, each one being roughly the quivalent of a can of tomatoes. From each batch we normally keep one lot in the fridge (as we use this at least once a week), and the rest goes into the freezer.

 

USING THE PASSATA

We use one pack of passata in place of a can of tomatoes. So, it forms the basis for chilli con carne, bolognese, lasagne, pasta sauces, etc etc.

 

If we just want a tomato sauce for pasta then I put a pack in a saucepan, bring to the boil, and boil rapidly until it has reduced to about half the quantity,. This makes a lovely thick sauce. You can add herbs or other flavourings at this point.

 

We use the passata to make roat tomato soup. All you need to do is puree the passata so it is smooth, add herbs if you wish, and heat gently. If you've a liking for creamy soups, you can stir through some double cream once it's hot.

 

FLAVOURING THE PASSATA

if you want to, you can flavour the passata in advance, by adding herbs etc to the tomatoes before you roast them. However, we don't do that (other than a litlle bit of garlic) as I like the convenience of a standard base. I don't want to have to search through loads of packs of passata to find one suitable for a specific dish. Instead, I add flavourings/herbs/spices at the point of using the passata.

 

ABOUT THE LIQUID YOU DRAIN OFF

This liquid is mainly tomato juice, with a little bit of oil.

We used to just throw this away, but then we tried it and discovered it has a really intense tomatoey flavour. Now we try and use it in our cooking.

 

We've found that we can stir 1/3-1/2 of the liquid back into the passata during the pulping. This increases the yield a little bit, without diminishing the flavour or consistency.

 

We've also made wonderful soup by pureeing the passata with all of the liquid (spooning off a bit of the oil first).

 

And we've used the liquid as a dipping sauce for ciabatta bread. We've also used it as a flavouring in its own right. I might try making a salad dressing with it next,.

 

I haven't tried storing for more than a couple of days though, so I can't advise on that.

 

 

 

 

[Cinnamon]

Thanks Hazel, that has gone onto my to do list for this summer

I always have a tomato glut & usually make lots of soup,but there really is a limit to the amount of soup you can eat

[Valkyrie]

Lovely - much better than plain pureed toms, I am dribbling already.

Thanks again.

[Lesley]

I use the same recipe and a passata machine - I bought it last year but then all our tomatoes had blight

 

I would just add that we found the slop that it pushes out at the side is too good to waste as it is and we put it back through the machine twice - three times in total. The resulting waste is then quite dry and all that is useable is in the passata.

 

The 'waste' is still tasty and both grandchildren and the dog decided it was too good to give to the pigs and ate it on their way over to the pig paddock