What to do with extra tomatoes?

[pepper]

After making and canning a bunch of pasta sauce, salsa, and stewed tomatoes (not to mention other non-tomato stuff I've been canning) I am tired of canning them. Over the next few days I am going to sundry some tomatoes but after that there will still be lots left.

At this point I start tossing them in the compost other then a few I eat each day. I can't give them away, most people I give them to only want a few because they don't last long before they get overripe. Does anyone have any ideas that doesn't involve canning? I still have a ton of peppers and some other things to preserve so the tomatoes need to be less focused on now.

 

[A. Lyric]

I envy your overabundance! If I had that problem, I might put a basket of tomatoes outside the entrance to Walmart with a "free"
sign, or contact a local senior center and ask if they can use them, or perhaps a homeless center or a pantry for the poor? I don't
know how feasible those ideas might be where you are located, but even sharing a basket with a bank or police station where
employees could take a couple home, might be something to consider? In any case...wow!

 

[Meadowlark]

That's a good problem to have. If you are like me, you don't want to see those great tomatoes go to waste.

If you have a local food bank, that is a great solution. We started doing this a few years ago and it has been really rewarding. Your produce isn't wasted and goes to a good cause.

 

[pepper]

I envy your overabundance! If I had that problem, I might put a basket of tomatoes outside the entrance to Walmart with a "free"
sign, or contact a local senior center and ask if they can use them, or perhaps a homeless center or a pantry for the poor? I don't
know how feasible those ideas might be where you are located, but even sharing a basket with a bank or police station where
employees could take a couple home, might be something to consider? In any case...wow!

That's a good problem to have. If you are like me, you don't want to see those great tomatoes go to waste.

If you have a local food bank, that is a great solution. We started doing this a few years ago and it has been really rewarding. Your produce isn't wasted and goes to a good cause.

Dropping some off at places like the police and fire department's might work!

I did try the local foodbank one year but even though they didn't specifically say no, they mentioned that one of the local churches has a large garden that had dropped off a bunch of stuff and said something about only being open 2 days a week. I'm sure if I was offering other garden stuff that lasts longer like potato's it would be a lot easier to give away but no one seems to want my abundance of tomatoes lol.

Because I am right inbetween the city limits and country I guess it's harder to give away with other gardener's and farmers giving their extra stuff to locals as well then if I was right in the city, but I avoid that city jungle as much as possible.

One idea I thought of after I posted this was simmering a bunch of tomatoes in a pot then letting it strain in cheesecloth to make some tomato juice, or tomato water? I'm not sure what I would get if I did that. Normally I would skin them and put them in a blender but that's more work then simmering and straining lol.

 

[Ruderunner]

Freeze them for now, make sauce or soup later.

 

[pepper]

Freeze them for now, make sauce or soup later.

I never thought about freezing them, that's a great idea!

 

[Ruderunner]

We would do that in bumper crop years,, like 300 plus pounds.

Let them thaw a bit then run them through a food mill.

 

[DirtMechanic]

I sauce mine and have discovered that using a very large frying pan I can fairly quickly reduce the sauce of a pot of tomato to a paste that takes up little room so I freeze it. It is not as pungent as the store canned type, but handles the liquid from any foods I cook with it very nicely.

 

[Oliver Buckle]

My missus cut them in half, seasoned and added a drizzle of olive oil, then put them in the oven. When cooked she scraped them out of their skins and froze them.

 

[pepper]

My missus cut them in half, seasoned and added a drizzle of olive oil, then put them in the oven. When cooked she scraped them out of their skins and froze them.

That's an interesting way of skinning them, I usually blanch them to take the skin off. Although I like the skin so most of the time I leave it on, depending what I am making.

 

[Oliver Buckle]

That's an interesting way of skinning them, I usually blanch them to take the skin off. Although I like the skin so most of the time I leave it on, depending what I am making.

I couldn't believe how difficult it was to peel a tomato when I first started cooking, then someone showed me blanching

 

[MiniOrchardDude]

Freeze them for now, make sauce or soup later.

I dont bother canning I just freeze them. Makes great salsa but needs to boil longer if you want a thicker salsa.

MOD

 

[Oliver Buckle]

That's an interesting way of skinning them, I usually blanch them to take the skin off. Although I like the skin so most of the time I leave it on, depending what I am making.

Talking to Jane she tells me there is sometimes a hard bit where the stalk attaches , and she can leave that behind.

 

[pepper]

Talking to Jane she tells me there is sometimes a hard bit where the stalk attaches , and she can leave that behind.

I always remove that part too, I cut around it and pop it out with a paring knife.

 

[DirtMechanic]

I always remove that part too, I cut around it and pop it out with a paring knife.

Well! I use a peeling knife! Far more dangerous and manly!