Tomatoes: A Sad Story

Last year our tomatoes sucked – plain and simple.  We didn’t have a single fruit ripen on the vine and the ones that were brought inside didn’t do that great either.  We attempted to ripen the tomatoes inside using two different methods.

The first method was the pick the tomatoes and simply to lay them on a brown paper covered table in the basement.  (The table wasn’t big enough for all of them so we put some in cardboard boxes on the floor.)  These tomatoes did change color but I’m not sure if you could say they ripened.  By the time they were red their skins were starting to shrivel and the flesh inside was starting to dry out and break down.

The second method was to remove the entire plant from the ground leaving the tomatoes attached and hang them in the cold room.  We used this method before and it worked wonderfully; this year it didn’t work at all.  Instead of ripening, the tomatoes shriveled, started to mold, and proceeded to fall off the plants.  This was very disappointing as we had utilized this method on the healthiest plants with the most fruit because of previous success.

When we hung the plants upside down we did one thing different from previous occasions and this “one thing” proved to give the exact opposite results.  Previously we left the roots on the plants, this year we removed the roots.  We cut the roots off because the root system is difficult to remove from the ground and it creates a lot of mess inside.   I’m thinking that by removing the roots we killed the plant rendering it incapable feeding/ripening the tomatoes; if we ever do this again we’ll be sure to leave the roots on the plant.

(If all works out as planned we won’t have to ripen tomatoes inside anymore as the intent is to build a greenhouse in the spring.)

Anyway, we had brought all the tomatoes inside in mid September.  By the time the end of October rolled around, as sad as the tomatoes looked, something needed to be done with them.  We simply couldn’t turf them; there was a lot of time and effort put into them.  There may have been a hand full of tomatoes that we could have eaten as is but the bulk of them were not looking too appetizing.  So what did I do with them?  I made tomato juice – lots of tomato juice.

I washed and cut them in chucks, and placed them in my largest pot; by the time I was done my 2 gallon pot was almost overflowing with tomatoes.  After cooking on low for a few hours I gave them a quick blend with my boat motor (hand mixer) and then they were ready for straining.  To strain them I ladled the mixture into a fine mesh strainer and then used the underside of the ladle to stir/force the juice through the strainer.  This would push the juice and some plump through leaving the seeds and skin behind to be easily discarded.  When everything was said and done, I ended up with about 30 cups of pure tomato juice.  Unfortunately the quality of the juice wasn’t that great, it was watery and quite acidic.

So what does one do with 30 cups of tomato juice? Freeze it and worry about it later!

Last weekend I finally took a few of the containers of tomato juice and made tomato soup.  The recipe I used was one that I had used last year and had found on a blog a visit frequently.  I had to tweak the recipe a little because of the poor flavor of my juice and also because I had tomato juice instead of tomatoes.  All and all it turned out pretty good.

We served it will a dollop of sour cream for some extra richness.  Soup anyone?

Tomato Soup Recipe:  http://www.formerchef.com/2009/08/02/how-to-make-fresh-tomato-soup