Yesterday, I bought one of Woolies bargains available for bearers of the Woolies Club Card. Tomatoes; 1 pack of 2 kilos for R20, take 2 for R30! Now, I hear you ask, what will you do with 4 kilos of ripe tomatoes even though you got each for a bargain price? They’ll go off before you know it! And where will your saving be then?
Well, the first thing I did was give a few away. 
That done, I took about 15 of them and oven roasted them with a little olive oil. When they were cold, I blended them to a fine pulp in order to use them as a pasta sauce or tomato soup. I’ll add herbs and seasonings when I use them.
While these were roasting, I halved about 18 of them, put them in the coolest part of the oven while I roasted the other trayful and dried them out. I had to switch off the oven when I went to bed as I have a gas oven, but I put them back this morning on VERY low, for a few more hours. I didn’t dry them out completely and when they were cold, I packed them into sterilised jars with some thyme (washed and dried) and some fresh garlic, and filled up the jars with good olive oil and a bit of salt. I used my new best friend, lemon infused olive oil from The Olive Tap at Food Lovers Market at Nicolway, for extra flavour, but any cold-pressed Extra Virgin olive oil will do. They will keep in the fridge almost indefinitely. Add them to soups and stews.
Thinking of that, I don’t think I made enough. . .:)
x
Elaine
Please note: although I wrote this about Woolies, every veggie shop and veggie department are selling tomatoes very cheaply so look out for them.
Hi Lainie,
with melted cheese on toast for breakfast.
It’s a wonderful idea to dry them! I am going to have a go.
My own version of tomatoes and olive oil included chopped garlic and some Italian herbs. It was very satisfying (or is that awesome?
I also made a jar without garlic for the days I was going to be close to people.
Posted by Jenny Sterne | September 7, 2012, 4:07 pmPartially drying them gives them an interesting flavour, I find. The other day I was making hamburgers for lunch and I realised that my ‘stash’ of tomatoes had been used up so I put a piece of dried marinated tomato on the burger instead and it was DELISH (awesome?
Posted by booksdefineme | September 20, 2012, 10:20 amOooo yum – it does sound delish
Posted by Cheap Luxury | September 20, 2012, 10:34 am