Zucchini & Tomato Soup

What else do you do with a giant zucchini - or two - but make a pot of soup (if you aren't making my Zucchin-Carrot Relish!) -- here are a couple recipes I have made recently, and since I put the information in on a web app - actually have the caloric data for it!

I threw in 3-4 frozen cubes of home made basil-garlic-raw almond pesto - so made the almonds an optional ingredient here, as well as the olive oil.  I also have a lot of roasted red padron puree in the freezer from last fall - one ice cube is roughly 1/4 c, I think, and I added that in - you could substitute Harissa paste (if you want heat), or chopped fresh red or green bell peppers.  Or throw in any spicy chopped peppers!

INGREDIENTS:

• 8 c zucchini, skin on, cut into large chunks (remove pithy parts and large seeds) (168 calories)
• 4 c crushed canned tomatoes (312 calories)
• 2 oz dried shitake mushrooms (200 calories) - or - 16 oz fresh button mushrooms, sliced
• 6 Carrots (150 calories)
• 1-2 c broccolini greens & florets (45 calories)
• 8 Garlic, Cloves, Fresh (35 calories)
• 1/2 c chopped basil leaves (4 calories)
• 2 c sweet/Vidalia onion, chopped or sliced to preference (128 calories)
• 2 T dried Thyme (or double fresh) (16 calories)
• 3 c cabbage, chopped (66 calories)
• 1/2 c green onion, chopped (9 calories)
• 8 c vegetable stock (160 calories)
• 2 packages Westsoy Chicken Style Seitan (770 calories)    
• 1 bunch of chopped parsley (16 calories)

Optional:

• 1.5 T Red miso (the refrigerated kind) (45 calories)
• 3 tsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil (120 calories)
• 3 Tb raw almonds, finely ground (102 calories)
• 1/4 roasted red padron puree (9 calories)

DIRECTIONS:

1. Break up the dried mushrooms into quarters or smaller and place into a heat proof dish or pan; pour boiling water over the mushrooms and allow to steep while you assemble the rest of the soup.
2. Pour the stock into the pan - note - I used tomato juice from canning tomatoes last year -- which is just the water that was around the seeds.  As I seed the tomatoes before putting them in the pot, I put all the seeds into a metal mesh strainer and then stir them around to get all that water out separately and save it for soups.  In this case, about 5 cups of my vegetable stock was tomato water (not sauce!).  If you like more tomatoey flavor, throw in another can or pint jar of crushed tomatoes -- they'll break down and give you plenty of flavor.
3. Add the Westsoy Chicken-Style Seitan - be sure to keep the broth in the container, it's tasty stuff - and tear up any extra large pieces of seitan with your fingers.
4. Add the carrots first - I slice them on the diagonal for nice big chunks, and put them into the stock first while it's heating up.  Add in the rest of the veggies items as ready -- and add additional water to cover if needed.
5. Reserve for last (as in - just a few minutes before serving) any fresh herbs and the red miso paste (which you can dissolve with a small whisk separately before adding in).
6. Salt & pepper to taste --  and yes, this a HUGE pot of soup but you can eat as much as you want because the entire thing is a whopping 2300 calories -- 12 large servings at 191 calories each!

   
   

Zucchini Vegetable Farro Soup (no onions/no garlic)

I made this giant pot of soup and shared it with my family - the corn kernels mix in with the similarly sized farro and provide a nice counterpoint of flavor and texture.  Tarragon & thyme provide the flavor - no onions or garlic in this soup, resulted in a soup that was sweet from the corn and carrots only.

INGREDIENTS:

• 10 c zucchini, skin on, cut into large chunks (remove pithy parts and large seeds if using monster zukes) (210 calories)
• 6 carrots (150 calories)
• 4 c crushed canned tomatoes (312 calories)
• 2 c farro (400 calories)
• 4 c broccoli or other sturdy greens like collards (140 calories)   
• 1 oz dried shitake mushrooms (100 calories) - or - 8 oz fresh button mushrooms, sliced
• 16 c vegetable stock (400 calories)
• 2 packages Westsoy Chicken Style Seitan (770 calories)   
• 2 ears of corn, cut off the cob (147 calories)
• 3 Tb "Mellow" white miso (90 calories)
• 4 tsp red miso (45 calories)
• Dried herbs to taste - I used lots of tarragon & thyme

DIRECTIONS:

1. Break up the dried mushrooms into quarters or smaller, place in a heat proof dish or pan and cover with boiling water to steep while you prepare the rest of the ingredients.  When they are soft, add the pieces and the water to the pot.
2. Pour the stock into a very large pot -- if you cut down the stock by half and use water instead, the soup will probably taste just as good!  Use what you have on hand!
3. Add the carrots first - I cut them up into big chunks, and put them in the pot so that they cook up faster.
4. Be sure to add the stock from the seitan package - it's yummy!  If you don't have this brand available where you live - substitute your favorite seitan or even some nice smoked tofu (yum!).
5. Add the miso paste last -- you will want to take some stock or hot water and dissolve it so that it mixes into the soup better.
6. Don't cut yourself cutting the fresh corn off the cob - after cutting off the niblets, be sure to scrape the cob with the back of your knife over the pot to get all the juice and flavor out of the corn cob (yum!).

Dried Tomato Disappointment

Looking for tea today, I moved my quart jar of dried Principe Borghese tomatoes - 8 lbs fresh.  Full of little worms covered in webbing (not moving around).  *sigh*  It only cost $5.60 for the tomatoes, but it took me a while to pick them and then wash, dry, slice and dehydrate them... I guess it's good I didn't eat them.  Was it one bad tomato?  Were there several? I'll never know.  I wonder if I should have frozen the dried tomatoes after they cooled off (just put the whole jar in the freezer, right?)

Fall Tomatoes

After spending 4 hours at Mariquita's farms in Gilroy, exhausted from picking 160 lbs of tomatoes - I wasn't sure I'd have energy for much else. It took nearly a full week for me to process two big batches of marinara and one big batch of pottsville relish!

The part that seems to take the most time is the same regardless of equipment - the foodmill. I use the food mill attachment on my Kitchen Aid, but I am pretty sure it took a lot longer using a chinois. I have to stop and take it apart to get all the skins out - but the chinois was a lot more physical labor.

Since I often cook red wine into my pasta sauce, I decided to put it in the sauce while I was cooking it down. I made sure to add lemon juice to each quart this year and processed everything nice and hot for a good 45 minutes.

Tomato sauce

• 27 qts

Pottsville relish

• ~2 gallons (forgot to count jars!)

Tomato juice

• 4 qts, frozen

Weekend Canning Round-up: Tomato Sauce, Zucchini Relish and Bread & Butter Pickles

Nine weeks out from my knee surgery, I am up and about almost back to normal in time for autumn canning season.  Tomatoes, basil, squash, apples, ground cherries, quince, persimmons - I just need to lay my hands on some lemons!

STOCK:  I made my best batch of stock yet, using the bag of veggie scraps I store in the freezer, along with the beet green stems from 3 bunches of white beets, stems from a bunch of radishes, and the seeds & skins of the tomato sauce making.  I even threw in the seeds & stems from a couple jalapenos used in salsa - giving the 2 gallons of stock a bit of zing but it's so rich and flavorful that I am going to use it to make some udon noodles this week. 

My newest favorite trick for making stock:  throw in a 1/4 cup of dried porcini mushrooms.

TOMATOES:
Tomatoes have suffered the worst of this chilly growing season -- as a result, nobody has tremendous backyard tomato production.  Even local farmers are finding the fruits are coming late and small.  I had been banking on picking 200# of tomatoes at Mariquita's "U-Pick" weekends this fall - the 150# I picked last fall didn't get me through the spring.  However, Julia said that they might not have a U-Pick event this fall (my fingers are still crossed, okay?). 

I bit the bullet and bought two 12# box of Early Girl tomatoes for $29 each.  I made up a big batch of marinara.  My friend Serafine helped me process the first batch of cooked tomatoes - we used the food mill attachment for the Kitchen Aid.  I think she was impressed by how easy it was to make sauce - she had seen cooking shows where they pour hot water on tomatoes to skin them and then cut out the seeds.  That's a PITA, IMO. 

Two weeks later, I bought two more 12# boxes of tomatoes last Thursday.  I spent all day cooking down the sauce - even pulled out 4 quarts of sauce from the first batch out of the freezer.  I ended up with a mere 9 quart jars of sauce, plus about 2 quarts that went into dinner each weekend - that's just under $10/jar to make my own sauce.  I guess I could go to Berkeley Bowl and buy sauce cheaper - but it doesn't taste at all the same.  After spending $120 on tomatoes (which is more than I spent last year for 150# at 50 cents/pound) - I think I am going to hold out and wait for tomato season to perk up so I can do the U-Pick event.

I didn't use all of the tomatoes for sauce - I also used some in a black quinoa tabouli, and made a quart of killer salsa (which goes great with carrot-flax crackers).  I still have a few in the fridge because those Early Girls are good eating!

YIELD:  
14 qts tomato sauce
1 qt salsa


APPLES:
Last Thursday I also got 20# of Pippin apples ($11 for 10#) from Mariquita - which I made into applesauce & dried apple rings.   The apples were mostly fairly large, a bright green and super crisp and delicious.  I saved about 8 of them for eating, put about 7# into the dehydrator and turned the rest into applesauce.

YIELD:
12 16 oz jars of applesauce
4 8 oz jars of applesauce


SQUASH:
Despite the problems my tomato plants are having in the garden - my squash are doing great.  The cocozelle is still going nuts with three vines that are about a total of 22' in length.  The yellow sunburst squash is more compact and still producing several a week.  The Rond de Nice - which I transplanted to a mini raised bed - has just showed signs that it is going to take off and be the rockstar of autumn.  The fourth zucchini plant that I bought - perished after it was sat upon at my "bon voyage" party on 7/9 - it limped along but transplanting it to another pot just resulted in speeding up the death.

I've been collecting squash all week - the small squash went into zucchini bread & butter pickles, the large squash went into the cuisinart to be shredded for zucchini relish.  I also saved the carrot pulp from the juicer to put into the relish - it made it a really pretty color.

YIELD:
12 8oz jars of zucchini relish
3  4 oz jars of zucchini relish
4 16 oz jars of zucchini bread & butter pickles
2 12 oz jars of zucchini bread & butter pickles
2 8 oz jars of zucchini bread & butter pickles


GROUND CHERRIES:
I'm collecting lots of ground cherries - mostly they are ripe but some are not.  I am experimenting with ways to ripen the green cherries - and have put them cleaned on a tray in the kitchen in the sun.  They might go into a bag soon.

Coming up - a trip to Larissa's house to check on the quince & persimmon trees!

Bread & Butter Pickles - 3 ways!

I just can't resist the allure of making up pickles to snack on over the winter and into next spring - I love bread & butter pickles. I made a promise to myself that next batch will be dilly - I'll do more dilly beans because the batches that I did with a half habanero quartered (but not separated) and pushed into the top of the jar turned out amazing!

Tonight, I turned my attention to the very large striped cocozelle and zucchini in the fridge, as well as 3# of 6" long pickling cucumbers from the garden. I also decided to take the last few unripe green tomatoes and sliced them up and did a bread & butter treatment just to see how it would turn out...

YIELD:
6 - 12 oz jars cucumber bread & butter pickles
4 - 12 oz jars zucchini bread & butter pickles
1 - 12 oz jar green tomato bread & butter pickles
1 - 8 oz jar green tomato bread & butter pickles

Fried Green Tomatoes Po-boy Sandwich

I remember a dear friend once asking me - "Where do you get green tomatoes?" - and when I said only from my garden, she got confused, thinking I meant some kind of heirloom - rather than unripe tomatoes. The idea of eating unripe tomatoes had never occurred to her - but there are so many things you can do with them - including frying and pickling them.

Fried green tomatoes are tangy and delicious - firm and unique. You can fry up ripe tomatoes the same way, but getting unripe tomatoes is something that requires timing and perfect seasonality.

I like to make a thin batter of flour & water to dip my sliced tomatoes, and then roll them in a mix of corn flour and wheat flour, black pepper, salt and paprika - and then fry them in canola or peanut oil. These were delicious topped with Green Zebra tomato jam and with the Fig-Tomato Chutney.

So, naturally - the next day, I decided to make a sandwich out of them.

Fried Green Tomato Sandwich:

• Leftover fried green tomato slices from the fridge
• Fresh bread - poboy bread would be idea, but Semifreddi's seeded sourdough baguette and ciabatta have worked pretty well
• Harissa (roasted red pepper spread) for the bottom piece of bread
• Add tomatoes - cut to fit on the bread
• Sprinkle salt & pepper if desired
  
• Add fig-tomato chutney
• Add fresh arugula - cut or tear pieces so that they don't just pull out of the sandwich when you eat it
• (vegan) garlic aoili on the top piece of bread
• fold your bread and eat it!

Green Zebra Tomato Jam

I got this idea from a recipe for Tomato Jam on paninis from a Portland newspaper - and sort of ran with it. You may not have Green Zebras on hand - but the fresh, ripe mellow flavor of green heirloom tomatoes is really good in this recipe.

• 2# of peeled, seeded & coarsely chopped tomatoes (drained - reserve the juice for bloody marys, for the love of mike!)
  
• 1 c. sugar
• 2 tsp fresh chopped thyme
• 1 tsp freshly ground white pepper
• 4 Tb sherry vinegar

Simmer til slightly thick - you still want to have some nice chunks of tomato - add a bit more sugar if it's not thickening up enough. It shouldn't be jammy sticky and thick - this is for savory sandwiches. Turns out this works really great on fried green tomato poboys.

YIELD:

8 - 4 oz jars

Pottsville Relish

The "official" version of this has cabbage in it - but my grandmother only used onions, tomatoes, green peppers, salt, vinegar & sugar.

RECIPE:
10# seeded, peeled & chopped tomatoes (reserve juice separately for soup)
8.5# to 10# chopped onions
5 large green bell peppers, seeded & chopped
2 c apple cider vinegar
2 c unrefined cane sugar
3 Tb salt

Cook down til the onions are translucent and you've reduced most of the liquid.

YIELD:
14 pint jars
11 half pint jars

Fig & Tomato Chutney

I found a recipe that looked interesting - a way to kill two birds with one stone, I thought - figs AND tomatoes! So, as usual - I've altered it quite a bit and the result smells amazing.

• 4# figs - quartered then roughly chopped*
• 3# onions - peeled and chopped all to hell in the Cuisinart DC10
• 4# Early Girl tomatoes, seeded, peeled & quartered
• 1 c. Thompson seedless raisins
• 1 c. sherry vinegar
• 1 c. apple cider vinegar
• 1 c. firmly packed brown sugar
• 1 c. sucanat
• 1 tb chili flakes
• 2 tb salt
• 1/2 tsp each whole white pepper, coriander seed, fenugreek seed & black mustard seed ground together

*I only quartered them and am going to have to fish out big pieces and smoosh them smaller!

Be sure to put the seeds and skins into a chinois or fine mesh strainer to allow you to capture the juice - the juice can be frozen in ice cube trays for later soups or drink it fresh (or make a bloody mary!)

Yum.

YIELD:

8 half pints
15 4 oz jars

57# of San Marzano Tomatoes

My friend Jeff visited on Saturday and took 10# of the San Marzanos, leaving me with 57# which I cooked in one big and one smaller batch.

I put everything into the giant colander over a big steel bowl and then ran that juice through the chinois (to capture the seeds), then smashed all the pulp and seeds out in the chinois.

Next step was to process through the Kitchen Aid fruit strainer/puree attachment which is not quite robust enough for a lot of tomatoes - I had to stop every 5-10 minutes to take it apart, unclog it and put it back together. Next time - I will get a big tomato press/strainer!

YIELD:

• 11 quarts San Marzano tomato sauce
• 7 pints San Marzano tomato sauce
• 3/4 of 1 quart jar (for dinner tonight!)
• 2 quarts San Marzano raw tomato juice (to be frozen for soup broth)
  

Tomatoes, Figs & Peppers, oh my!

Perhaps I overcompensated but... the tomatoes were so friendly at Mariquita's U-Pick day, and their skins so warm and compelling to my touch... I ended up bringing home 67# of San Marzanos, and 60# of mixed heirlooms, Early Girl, Beefsteak and Green Zebra tomatoes. Along with 2# of pimientos de padron (including a big bag that Julia warned were "too hot" to sell because most of her customers fail to appreciate the charm of super spicy pimientos de padron), several pounds of red and yellow bell peppers, 20 (more) bunches of basil (because I just can't get enough pesto!),

I still have to put up the figs and am looking over fig chutney recipes to occupy my afternoon while the tomatoes cook down... some ideas are fig & tomato chutney, fig chutney with Meyer lemon zest & (canned) pineapple, fig & red pepper chutney, and fig & persimmon chutney. I'm also going to try my hand at tomato jelly this week, as well as defrosting the apricots to make up some apricot chutney.

Heirloom Tomatoes - U-pick - 50 cents/pound!

Tomato Upick 2009: Mariquita has a great event this Saturday - which, alas, I will not be able to enjoy since I will be otherwise engaged. If you want to get down to Hollister, you can pick tomatoes for 50 cents/pound, bring your own boxes.

Figs, Beans & Tomatoes

GARDEN has been looking quite pathetic. James suggested I just get out the hoe and clear the whole area and start over. I'm determined that the volunteers and scraggly looking plants I got from the farmer's market will make it.

Since he's going out of town, James gave me 11 2' high tomato plants in half gallon pots, started from my seeds, which he had not the space and we worried they would die on the deck in his absence. I also was gifted a dozen small tomato plants in 2-4" pots by Scott's neighbor Devin.

So, as you may imagine, after a weekend of many other friend related tasks - I had a busy day today. I made up some green fig jam, spicy dilly beans, cleaned out James' fridge of perishables and then weeded my garden and found some cucumbers and planted tomatoes. I also harvested some cucumbers from my garden to give to Hastings & Catherine -- I have a bunch of cucumbers from James which I want to turn into bread & butter pickles before I leave on my trip on Tuesday.

SPICY DILLY BEANS - James gave me all the string beans in his garden since he won't be around to pick them or eat them for a week - together we cleared about a pound and a half. We agreed that they would make fine hot dilly beans. This time, they are going to be really spicy. And more garlic. I cut dill flowers and leaves from my garden (yay!) and included 1 habanero and 1 serrano and 2-4 cloves of garlic in each 12 oz jar.

GREEN FIG JAM - The figs that I picked ripe on Monday at Susie & Rich's kept pretty well in the fridge. I learned, however, that picking unripe figs and leaving them on the tray to ripen seems to result only in "hrm, not quite ready" to a giant hairy moldball the next day. So, the bowl of ripe figs in the fridge resulted in 4 cups of mashed, simmered fruit - and a fine light green fig jam.

YIELD:

• 5 - 12 oz jars dilly beans
• 8 - 4 oz jars green fig jam
• 2 - 8 oz jars green fig jam

SEEDLING FAIL, Redux

I am very worried for my seedlings. The seedlings are way too long and leggy. The conditions are the same as last year - except that I started the seeds in March, and here it is already May. So, I set up two grow lights and put a heating pad under the tray. I pulled out the really leggy seedlings that look seriously doomed and replanted -- fingers crossed!

Tomates a la Provencale

Tomates a la Provencale turned out so well on Saturday that I think I am about to experience a slight addiction similar to the bruschetta addiction that ran from 2000-2002. Except, less bread, more tomatoes. This preparation is something I have done in the past - but for some reason, it went into a black hole in my brain and most of my tomatoes this season have been eaten raw or made into sauces.

No longer - I am going to be binging on garlic, fresh herbs and tomatoes from my garden, all baked up with a spritz of olive oil and panko until the juices are bubbly and the bread crumbs are crispy. Game on!

I swear - pictures are coming - I totally failed to take pictures of all the delicious food on Saturday and have not managed to actually get pictures of any of my roasted tomatoes in the last three days. Mmmm... tomatoes.

RECIPE:

1. Desired quantity of fresh tomatoes halved across the middle (if large) or stem end sliced (if small or mushy). You can use ripe tomatoes or tomatoes that are semi-ripe or green.
2. Place tomatoes into a baking dish or bread pan -- something with sides.
   
3. Mound tomatoes with fresh (more) or dried herbs (less) - my favorites are thyme and oregano, though I mix it up a bit and add lavender, rosemary or basil.
4. Mound each tomato half with pressed garlic - as much as you have in the fridge or desire. Mound it, baby. Don't skimp!
5. Sprinkle the top of the tomatoes with panko or fine bread crumbs (you can make it with stale bread ends or toast the bread in the oven while it preheats).
6. Sprinkle with coarsely ground black pepper and coarse Celtic sea salt.
7. Drizzle with olive oil.
8. Drizzle with olive oil.
9. Drizzle with ... oh. Nevermind. Just make sure it's really good olive oil.
10. Bake in oven at 350-400 F depending on how much your oven wildly fluctuates until there are bubbling hot juices in the bottom of the pan but before the tomatoes are completely falling apart. You want to have something yummy to sop up with a piece of bread but you also want to be able to eat the tomato with a fork.

Don't forget the garlic. Lots of it. Yum.

Tomatoes are planted!

I just received 17 varieties of heirloom tomato seeds. The seedlings are all planted and germinating. I plan to make tomato paste, dried tomatoes and plenty of other tomato-y goodness. Some will be planted at the boyfriend's house and some at my house -- and I may bring some containers to other friends to see how the cold weather tolerant varieties do in San Francisco.

I'm sure I'll have lots of extra plants -- if you live in Oakland, add your comment and I'll keep you in mind after we start figuring out how many will survive and how many we can put in the ground.

	Moskovich-Tomato Seeds Early season ("extra early")
	Peacevine Cherry-Tomato Seeds Mid-season, high amino acid content, high Vitamin C content cherry tomato
	Super Snow White-Tomato Seeds Mid-season, very sweet, white ping pong ball size
	Wonder Light-Tomato Seeds Mid season, "plum lemon" w/mild sweet flavor (yellow catsup, anyone?)
	Amana Orange-Tomato Seeds Late season, "huge" beefsteak, fluted/irregular, 2# or more
	Aunt Ruby’s German Green-Tomato Seeds Mid-season, "lime jello" color - super fruity, slightly spicy
	Aunt Ruby's Yellow Cherry-Tomato Seeds Mid-season, Very productive, fruity-tart.
	Black Cherry-Tomato Seeds Early season, tall vigorous plant, sweet, complex, round black cherry tomato.
	Blondkopfchen-Tomato Seeds Mid-season. "Plant produces phenomenal clusters of 20-30 very-very-very tasty gold/yellow grape-sized (1/2") cherries. Put this in your mouth and see if you can keep from smiling."
	Brandywine, Red-Tomato Seeds Late season, 1-1 1/2#, pink/purple meaty fruit, good for canning.
	Debarao-Tomato Seeds Great paste tomato, mid-season
	Green Zebra-Tomato Seeds Developed in 1985 for Alice Waters/Chez Panisse - these are available at farmer's markets, WF, BB and are really yum.
	Hawaiian Pineapple-Tomato Seeds Late season. Large 1-1 1/2# beefsteak, sweet, slightly pineapple flavored - had to have these!
	Principe Borghese Mid-season, good for drying - supposed to be the most flavorful
	Yellow Ruffled Mid-season. Ruffled/indeterminate. Good for stuffing - and they photographed it on a Blue Willow plate!
	Paul Robeson Mid-season. Black beefsteak tomato, good for lower growing temps.
	Italian Tree Late season. These must be staked - the plant grows up to 15' tall and produces a lot of tomatoes - "enormous amounts of meaty, 1-2 pound, 4-5-inch, red tomatoes with superior sweet flavors." I think I'll have the most trouble with this one (wrt over production)
	Aker's West Virginia - BONUS from the TomatoFest Folks A family heirloom tomato of Craig Lehoullier's friend, Carl Aker of Pennsylvania. Originally from West Virginia. These organic tomato seeds produce a vigorous highly productive, regular leaf, heirloom tomato plant that yields an excellent set of large, 10 to 16-ounce, deep-red, slightly flattened tomatoes in clusters of 2. Fruits show little or no cracking and have a well balanced sweetness to acidity. Delicious, robust flavors.