Early Girl Tomato Sauce with Roasted Onions and Garlic
make about 4 – 5 pints

8 lbs early girl tomatoes, stems removed
salt
pepper
2 T. dried herbs (Italian seasoning blend, or a mixture of rosemary, thyme, basil, marjoram, and sage)
1 head garlic
olive oil
1 sweet onion
2 yellow onions

Bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil.  Prepare a large bowl of ice water and set aside.

Cut a small X in the bottom of each tomato, then add tomatoes in batches to the boiling water.  Blanch for about 30-45 seconds, or until the skin starts to peel away from the tomato flesh.  The blanching time depends on the ripeness of your tomatoes.  Remove from the boiling water and place into the ice water.  Repeat until all tomatoes are blanched.

Place a fine mesh strainer over a large pot (a 5 qt dutch oven works well).  Remove the tomatoes from the ice water and peel the skins off and discard.  Squeeze each tomato over the strainer so that the juices go into the pot but not the seeds.  Add the de-seeded tomatoes to the pot.  They will break down while cooking, so there is no need to chop them.

Add about 1 t. each salt and pepper to the tomatoes, as well as the dried herbs, then bring to a boil over medium heat.  Reduce the heat to low and simmer for about 1.5 hours, stirring occasionally and scraping the bottom of the pan to dislodge any stuck bits, until the tomato sauce has thickened, but is still a little more watery than you’d like for the final product.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 400 degrees.  Slice the top quarter off the head of garlic, drizzle with olive oil, then wrap loosely in foil.  Loosely wrap the un-peeled onions individually in foil, then put them along with the garlic into the oven and roast for about 1 hour.  Remove from oven, open foil, and allow to cool.  Once cool, peel and chop the onions, and squeeze the garlic cloves out of their skins. and mash into a paste

Add the onions and garlic to the tomato mixture, mix well, and gently simmer for another 45 minutes or so  Taste and season with more salt, pepper, herbs, or even a little acid (balsamic vinegar, for example).  Use immediately, refrigerate for up to a week, or freeze in small portions for future use.  Enjoy!

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I lack self control when it comes to buying vegetables from Mariquita Farms.  In no way, shape, or form did I need twelve pounds of early girl tomatoes.  But something — my vision of delicious ripe tomatoes paired with a lack of vegetable self control, most likely — made me check the box ’1 flat Early Girl Tomatoes’ on the online order form.  A few days later I found myself at Piccino picking up not only the twelve pounds of tomatoes, but also ten pound of apples and a 15-20 lb “Mystery Box” of vegetables (including more tomatoes!)…  Delicious, yes.  But we’re just two people!  What was I thinking?

From the moment I picked up the tomatoes, the whole thing seemed like an ill-fated endeavor.  To start, I couldn’t carry the 40 lbs of vegetables to my car by myself and had to have someone help me (which she did very graciously!).  Next, there was no way I was going to fit that much produce into my fridge.  Really? 40 lbs?  that’s like if I tried to put my cat into the fridge four times over… or maybe my entire left leg… you get my point — that’s a lot of produce.  After that, I discovered that fruit flies LOVE tomatoes.  Since I couldn’t put them in the fridge both because of space constraints and the fact that one should never put tomatoes in the fridge, I left them on the counter only to find the box swarming with fruit flies the next morning…  ugh.  What was I thinking?

Ok.  I know what I was thinking.  I was thinking — these Mariquita Farms tomatoes are SO GOOD and they are only available for a few short weeks every year! I missed tomato season last year because I was in the process of moving back from Germany, and I absolutely didn’t want to miss it this year.  That’s what I was thinking.  So what if I had 14 lbs of tomatoes staring me in the face?  I vowed to make good use of them.

And make good use of them I did!  I dried about 4 lbs of them (cut in half, dry in a 200 degree oven on oiled cookie racks until dry but still pliable, about 4 hours), saved one lb, and made the rest into this awesome, simple tomato sauce.  I’ve been using it for all sorts of things since I made it this weekend — as a dipping sauce for cheesy bread, as pizza sauce, mixed with sauteed greens, eating it straight from the jar with a spoon… you know, the usual :)

The most time consuming part of this recipe is blanching and peeling the tomatoes.  If you have a food mill, you can ENTIRELY skip this step!  I didn’t use my food mill this time since I desired a chunky sauce, but I discovered the tomatoes break down so much while cooking that it would have been a wash texture-wise between blanching & skinning the tomatoes versus roughly chopping them with the skin and seeds and passing the mixture through a food mill (which removes skins and seeds) after cooking (but before adding the onions).  Next time I have this many tomatoes I’ll definitely use the food mill and save myself about an hour of blanching and skinning.  Live and learn.

Well, tomato season is upon us for probably 3-4 more weeks, and if you find you cannot exercise tomato self-control (similar to me) when confronted with a case of beautiful dry-farmed tomatoes, try this recipe and know that you will have delicious tomato sauce for weeks, months to come.  Enjoy!

Roasted onions and garlic — I roasted one too many onions, but have been making great use of it on other things!

Still Hungry?  Try one of these:

- Wintertime Tomato Sauce

- Simplest Tomato Sauce with Roasted Onion, Shallots and Garlic

- Tomato and Cheese Auflauf

Auflauf, gratin, casserole…?  Because I am 1) living in Germany, 2) obsessed with french cookbooks, and 3) decidedly American at heart, I sometimes just don’t know what to call the things I make for dinner.  Gratin?  no… this isn’t elegant enough to be called a gratin.  Casserole?  no… this conjures images of canned tuna and cream of mushroom soup.  Auflauf?  what in the world is auflauf?? (answer: it’s the German word for casserole).  OK then, we’ll go with “auflauf”.  Besides, assonant words tickle my fancy… pow-wow, humdrum, teeny-weeny, sci-fi, potpourri, soporific… let’s add “auflauf” to the list.

Whatever one decides to call it, this is an incredibly simple dish to prepare. The only prep work is to seed and chop the tomatoes, chop an onion, sliver some basil, and mix the cheeses together.  There is no precooking (no sweating onions, blanching tomatoes, etc), so the dish comes together in about 10 minutes.

The end product has a fairly loose consistency, and spreads a little on the plate.  Creamy, fresh, and just a little spicy, the auflauf is delicious eaten on its own  or scooped onto warm bread.  And although I haven’t tried it, I imagine it would also be tasty spooned over pasta or polenta, or perhaps mixed with cooked whole grains for a summer grain salad (I am imagining a mixture of barley, farro, wheat berries, etc).  Or of course, you can follow the original idea from Simply Recipes and make it into a pie.

Long live auflauf! :)

Tomato and Cheese Auflauf
Adapted from Tomato Pie at Simply Recipes
serves 3-4, depending on accompaniments

~1 1/4 lbs ripe tomatoes, seeded and coarsely chopped
1 medium red onion, chopped
1/4 c. basil, slivered
Salt and Pepper
2 c. grated mixed cheese (suggestion: 2/3 c. mozzarella, 2/3 c. cheddar, 2/3 c. gouda)
3/4 c. mayonnaise
1/2 T. Tabasco or other hot pepper sauce

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Lightly oil a medium sized casserole dish.

Spread chopped tomatoes over the bottom of the casserole, then sprinkle evenly with the red onion and basil.  Season liberally with pepper, and lightly with salt.

Mix the cheese, mayonnaise, and hot pepper sauce in a bowl, then evenly spread over the top of the tomatoes.  Bake until bubbly and golden brown, about 45 minutes.  Enjoy!

Still Hungry?  Try one of these:

- Summer Squash and Roasted Tomato Timbales

- Simplest Tomato Sauce with Roasted Onion, Shallots and Garlic

- Wintertime Tomato Sauce

Crustless Quiche with Tomatoes, Zucchini, and Salami
Adapted from Tartine

~1/3 c. sun-dried tomatoes (dry packed)
~1/3 -1/2 c. salami, chopped
1/2 of a zucchini, cut into small uniform pieces

5 large eggs
3 T. flour
1 c. creme fraiche
1 c. whole milk
1 t. salt
1/2 t. black pepper
1 T. fresh parsley, chopped

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.  Lightly grease a 9 inch pie plate.

Heat 1-2 c. water until boiling.  Place the sun-dried tomatoes in a medium bowl and pour the boiling water over them.  Re-hydrate the tomatoes for 15 minutes, then drain and finely chop.  Set aside.

Meanwhile, heat a small frying pan over medium heat.  Lightly saute the salami until some fat is rendered and the edges start to crisp.  Press the salami to one side of the pan so some of the fat drains off.  Remove the salami from the pan and set aside, but leave the fat.  Reheat the pan, then saute the zucchini pieces in the rendered fat (if there isn’t much fat, add a little bit of butter or olive oil).  Saute the zucchini for about 5-7 minutes until the edges start to turn brown.  Add the zucchini to the salami and set aside.

In a medium bowl, whisk one egg and the 3 T. of flour until smooth.  Add the remaining four eggs, and whisk until smooth.

In a large bowl, whisk the creme fraiche until smooth.  Add the milk and whisk again.  Add the egg mixture, then the salt, pepper, parsley, sun-dried tomatoes, salami, and zucchini.  Mix well.  Pour into the prepared pie plate, and place in the middle of the oven.  Bake for 10 minutes, then turn the heat down to 325 and bake for an additional 35-40 minutes, until the center of the quiche is slightly firm to the touch.  Remove from the oven and cool on a wire rack for 20 minutes before slicing.  Enjoy!

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I had a quiche epiphany the first time I tasted the quiche from Tartine Bakery in San Francisco.  The texture was amazing — light, fluffy, and almost custard-like.  It was a far cry from the dense, slightly dry, slightly rubbery texture that my mind conjured when I heard the word quiche.

Though I sadly live thousands of miles from oh-so-delicious Tartine Bakery nowadays, the Tartine cookbook has a recipe for basic quiche that is just as good as the quiche they sell in the shop.  The key ingredients for the fluffy texture are copious amounts of creme fraiche and whole milk, along with a little bit of flour.

If you’re appalled that the recipe calls for 1 cup of creme fraiche AND 1 cup of whole milk, then, well, that’s unfortunate because you’ll be missing out on perhaps the most amazingly textured quiche in existence.  I fall pretty squarely into the camp that ‘fat doesn’t make you fat, sugar and excess carbohydates do’, so you’ll get no apology from me for the fat content of this quiche.

As for filling, let your taste and imagination be your guide.  The past few quiches I have made have used sun-dried tomatoes and brianza salami that I picked up on a recent trip to Lake Como, Italy.  Chopped cooked asparagus or spinach would also be delicious, along with numerous other vegetable and herb combinations.  I have heard that at Tartine they even make a nettle quiche during the spring!

And though this quiche is crustless, I am quite sure that it would be delicious with a crust as well.  If you decide to go that route, use your favorite crust recipe, and fully bake it before adding the filling.  Then, bake the quiche as directed above.

I’ve been in the routine of making a quiche on sunday, which I then eat for breakfast during the week.  When I get up, I place a slice in a low oven to reheat it, and by the time I am out of the shower and dressed, the quiche is thoroughly heated and ready to be eaten.  Delicious and filling!

Still Hungry?  Try one of these:

- Flammkuchen (Onion, Bacon, and Creme Fraiche Tart)

- Chocolate Flecked Meringues (aka Rochers)

Sundried Tomato and Fennel Sausage

1/3 c. dry packed sun-dried tomatoes
1/2 – 1 T. olive oil
4 T. cold water
2 t. fennel seeds, freshly ground
3 garlic cloves, finely minced
1/2 T. fresh thyme, finely minced
1 1/2 t. salt
1/2 t. white pepper
2 lbs pork shoulder, well chilled

Place the sun-dried tomatoes in a bowl, and cover with boiling water.  Allow to soften for 15 minutes, then drain and finely chop.  Place chopped tomatoes in a small bowl, then mix with the olive oil, water, fennel, garlic, thyme, salt, and pepper.  Set aside

Cut the pork into smallish cubes, about 3/4 inch or so.  Pass through the coarse plate of a meat grinder.  Place pork in a bowl, then using your hands, mix in the tomato and fennel spice mixture until well combined.  Pass meat mixture through the coarse plate of the meat grinder one more time, then place in a bowl and refrigerate for at least two hours or overnight to allow the flavors to blend.

Shape into patties and fry, stuff into casings, or simply saute the loose sausage.   Enjoy!

Alternatively, if you don’t have a meat grinder, if you ask nicely, most butchers will grind the meat for you in their shop.  Or you can simply start with ground pork, adding 1/4 c. or so extra chopped fat from slab bacon or pork belly

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Sometimes you find an ingredient that just inspires you.  Usually for me it’s not something that’s exotic or expensive, but rather something that is of such high quality or is so fresh that you want to run home and cook something with it *right now*!

Such were the dried tomatoes I found at a small salumeria in Como, Italy this past weekend.  Steven and I went down for a long weekend and pretty much ate ourselves silly with amazingly delicious Italian food.  The highlight was an under-the-stars dinner on the terrace at Al Giardino (on Via Monte Grappa, if you happen to be in the area) in the outskirts of Como — fresh burrata, handmade pasta with fresh spicy sausage, breaded and fried lamb chops, a chocolate and pear tart, and oh the red wine!

But back to the tomatoes.  These dried tomatoes are perfectly pliable, deep rusty red, and highly aromatic.  Personally, I find more uses for dry packed tomatoes than tomatoes packed in oil, though both have a time and a place.  Once I got back home, I started thinking of ways to use the tomatoes… tomato cream sauce, polenta with dried tomatoes, egg custard with dried tomatoes and herbs… and then my mind drifted to sausage — I do live in Germany, you know :).

Making sausage is really much easier than one would think, especially if you just make patties or use it as bulk sausage.  Most of the time when I buy sausage links, I end up taking it out of the casings anyway, so when making my own, I rarely bother with the stuffing step.  If you don’t have a meat grinder, then things are even easier!  Just ask your butcher to grind whatever meat you purchase there in the shop.  If possible, start with a cut of meat rather than buying pre-ground pork, as you are more likely to get the meat to fat ratio correct with a cut like a picnic shoulder or boston butt.  Then just mix in the seasonings, and you have bulk sausage.

And one last note, definitely don’t skimp on the fat when making sausage — an 85/15 or 80/20 meat to fat ratio is ideal.  Less than that and your sausage will have a grainy, dry texture.  And really, if you’re going to go to the trouble of making sausage from scratch, shouldn’t it be as tasty as possible?  And speaking of the taste of this sausage — it’s fantastic!  Herby with a hint of savory sweetness from the tomatoes, and just the right amount of pepper — delicious at any meal!

Bulk Sausage

Breakfast Patties

Still Hungry?  Try one of these:

- Homemade Greek Orange Sausage (Loukanika)

- Wintertime Tomato Sauce

- Simplest Tomato Sauce with Roasted Onion, Shallots and Garlic

Wintertime Tomato Sauce

2 T. olive oil
1 large yellow onion, finely chopped
6-8 garlic cloves, minced
1 t. salt
1 t. red pepper flakes
28 oz. can diced tomatoes

Heat olive oil in a 2 qt pot over medium heat.  Add onions and garlic, and saute until the onions start to relax and the garlic takes on a little bit of color, about 7 minutes.  Add salt and red pepper flakes and mix well.  Add tomatoes, still well, and bring mixture to a gentle boil.  Reduce heat, and simmer uncovered for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Enjoy!

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Let’s face it — fresh tomatoes you buy in the grocery store during the wintertime are awful.  They’re usually shipped in from factory farms in far off lands, and more often than not have a mushy, mealy texture, and a color closer to salmon than the glorious deep red of summer tomatoes from the farmer’s market (or if you’re one of the lucky ones, from your garden).  I am going to go ahead and say it — yuck.

But just because it’s winter doesn’t mean that I don’t want homemade tomato sauce… During the summer it’s easy to make homemade tomato sauce — a few fresh tomatoes, some roasted onions and garlic, salt, pepper… chop, mix, heat, simmer — and you have delicious and simple tomato sauce.  But what to do in winter?  My first instinct is to say, ‘preserve in summer, eat in winter’… but my life is such that making huge batches of tomato sauce during the summer and using it throughout the year isn’t really feasible.  For one, I just made a trans-atlantic move, and shipping quarts of homemade tomato sauce (though a tempting idea) didn’t make a lot of sense.  Also, before that, my apartment was approximately 520 square feet (shared with Steven and our cat Fluppha), so storage for more than a few jars of my favorite homemade lemon marmalade or elderberry preserves was non-existent.

So what to do?  For my answer I turn to canned tomatoes.  Surprisingly better than you would expect, with canned tomatoes you can make a homemade sauce coming in somewhere around 7 – 7.5, where store-bought sauce is typically a 3 – 4, and homemade summertime sauce is in the 9 – 10 range.  If you start with high quality canned tomatoes, you will end up with a tasty, nearly from scratch sauce that is great for a lot of things — spaghetti, lasagne, pizza topping, base for tomato soup, etc — with only about 10 minutes of work.

Tonight we finished up the last of the latest batch (one batch is about four servings, or two meals for two people).  Tonight it was a topping for plain spaghetti, served with garlic bread (knoblauch brot) on the side.  Delicious and simple.  And a little spicy!

Still Hungry?  Try one of these:

- Simplest Tomato Sauce with Roasted Onion, Shallots and Garlic

- Summer Squash and Roasted Tomato Timbales

- Quick Citrus Pickled Red Onions

Pie Crust with Rendered Bacon Fat (aka Bacon Grease Pie Crust) (aka the BEST pie crust ever)

1 c. rendered bacon fat
2 1/2 c. AP flour
1 t. salt
1/2 t. sugar
4-6 T. very cold water

Measure bacon fat and then freeze either in plastic wrap or a platic cup/bowl for approximately 1 hour.  Remove cold fat from freezer, then cut into 1/2 inch cubes.

Sift flour, salt, and sugar into a mixing bowl, then cut bacon fat into flour mixture until it resembles coarse pea-sized pebbles.  Gradually mix in 4T of water, mixing with a fork until dough just comes together.  The dough is ready if you pinch a fingerfull together and it does not crumble.  If necessary, Add more water, 1T at a time until dough reaches desired consistancy.

Place dough onto a clean cutting board, press together, then split into two balls.  Wrap each ball in plastic wrap, flatten, and refrigerate about 1 hour (or longer).

Remove dough from refrigerator, place on a lightly floured cutting board, then roll out into a 12-inch circle (about 1/8 in thick) (Hint: often I will place the plastic wrap or a piece of wax paper over the dough while rolling it out so it won’t stick to the rolling pin).  Transfer to 9-inch pie pan, and trim the edges if desired.

Repeat with second dough ball, and either use immediately, refrigerate for up to 2 days, or place dough between 2 sheets of parchment paper, roll up, wrap in plastic wrap, and freeze for future use.

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Oh.  My.  God.  This is the best pie crust I have ever tasted!  So flaky.  So moist.  And oh the hint of bacon…

In preparing for our move to Germany, I have been going through the cupboards, the refrigerator, and the freezer trying to use up all those things that I bought ‘for future use’ that I have never gotten around to using (ummm, 6 types of dried seaweed for example!) or have been saving because it’s too good to throw away (namely, rendered bacon fat from all that lovely farmer’s market bacon I’ve been buying most weeks — no matter how much bacon I buy, Steven and I seem to go through it with gusto!)

Looking through my refrigerator, I realized I had not one, but TWO pint jars filled with rendered bacon fat.  I think it’s great to cook with, but really, am I going to use 4 cups of bacon grease between now and when we’re leaving at the end of december?  probably not.  So, I decided that rather than throwing away all that good, organic fat, I would perform a culinary experiment I’ve always wondered about (and that there is frightfully little information on the internet about) — a homemade pie crust made with rendered bacon fat!

So, I went to my typical go-to pie crust and adapted it to use rendered bacon fat.  And oh, it was delicious!  Besides the hint of bacon, the most remarkable thing about the crust is how incredibly flaky it is.  This is due (I believe) to freezing the fat beforehand and not overmixing.

Note though — this is not a neutral pie crust!  I wouldn’t recommend using this crust for sweet pies (though it *might* be good if you wanted to make something like this).  No, this is meant to be used as a base for savory pies, quiches, and tarts (imagine spinach pie, onion tart, tomato quiche).  I think it lends itself particularly well to vegetable pies;  it has a hint of smoky meatiness that pairs well with a zingy, fresh vegetable filling.

I used this crust to make a fold-over spinach and tomato tart.  Instead of placing pie crust in a pie pan, I transferred it to a baking sheet, sprinkled on some grated swiss cheese, then layered sauteed spinach with garlic, oven roasted tomatoes (homegrown, thank you very much!), some leftover cooked squash, some fresh oregano, and more swiss cheese, leaving about a two inch border of crust.  Then, I folded the crust over, brushed it with an egg wash, then baked it at 375 for about 30 minutes until it was golden brown and the cheese was bubbly.  Delicious!!!

And one final note, I looked up the nutritional information about rendered bacon fat versus butter, and calorie and fat content-wise, they’re not that different.  So, even though this feels totally decadent, it’s really no worse than a regular butter or lard crust.  And it is oh so tasty…

Still Hungry?  Try one of these:

- Flammkuchen (Onion, Bacon, and Creme Fraiche Tart)

- No-Knead Wheat-y Rye Bread

- Creamed Swiss Chard with Bacon