Wow that's a combination! But, I promise they are all relevant to this entry.
First, I wanted to share a great little recipe for making your own sun-dried tomatoes. Okay, so technically they are not "sun-dried" but the result is the same. As I've shared in previous posts, my garden runneth over with tomatoes..especially cherry tomatoes.
Which is great, except when you have so many you feel like you are drowning in them. I mean, you can only make so many salads with cherry tomatoes on top and they are not really the best for freezing or canning. What they are perfect for though, is oven drying. Oven drying is a great alternative to sun drying your tomatoes and will let you enjoy the taste of your fresh tomatoes way into the winter.
Oven drying your tomatoes is a fairly easy process. You will need to wash your tomatoes and then half the cherry tomatoes and half or quarter the roma tomatoes. I had lots of cherry and a few roma so I dried both. Squeeze out some of the seeds in a bowl. And they lay your tomatoes down skin side up on a cookie sheet rubbed with olive oil.
If you are drying two different types of tomatoes I suggest placing them on separate cookie sheets. The smaller tomatoes will obviously take less time to dry. Drizzle a very small amount of olive oil over your tomatoes and then place in your oven. If you have a gas range the pilot light alone may be enough to dry them slowly, an electric oven needs to be set on warm or the very lowest setting you have. It will take several hours to dry your tomatoes, anywhere from 5-8 hours or more. You will need to turn your tomatoes over for the last couple of hours to make sure that the cut sides dry properly. You will know they are ready when they have the consistency of a raisin. Chewy, not brittle but you do not want the tomatoes to have any liquid remaining in them.
For added assurance you can place your dried tomatoes in a paper sack and hang them somewhere cool for a few days. I hung mine in the pantry. This will assure that your tomatoes are completely dehydrated without overcooking them in the oven. I store my tomatoes in an airtight jar in the fridge. They can also be frozen. When you are ready to use your tomatoes you can rehydrate then in olive oil for a few hours or throw them in your favorite pasta dish, sauce, etc. Use them like you would those expensive ones you buy in the store, but you get to be smug cause you got yours for free!
So now to tie in Sisters and Saturdays. As you all know I have the privilege of living in the south (okay upper south...okay barely the south…but still since it’s considered the south by Southern Living, so I’m sticking to my story). My sister, on the other hand, lives in the beautiful Northwest but is a southern gal at heart…hence the name of her blog.
Southern In My Heart
We are two girls who believe in down home cooking, welcoming you warmly to our homes, proper manners, calling your elders ma'am and sir and good ole' Southern Hospitality!
It has been one of the greatest disappointments in my adult life, not having ever lived in the same town as my sis.
We are best friends, and it hurts my heart not to be able to run over to her house for a cup of coffee, or to pick up my nephew and niece for a trip to the park. We have managed though, to stay very close through long phone chats, emails, and regular vacations to each other’s homes.
Another activity has brought us even closer these last few months…blogging! We love to chat about our blogs, bounce ideas off each other, comment on people’s comments (always positive I promise! grin!) and give each other verbal high-fives for a blog well written. In fact, we have had so much fun walking the blogging journey together that we decided, “Heck, why not blog together occasionally?!”
Thus, Sisters Saturday was born!
An opportunity for two sisters who live miles apart to blog together, sharing ideas, recipes and our homes.
This will allow us to have “virtual” dinners and parties together and you our readers are invited to join us!
So c’mon back y’all this Saturday for our first installment of Sisters Saturday,which will be an occasional feature on our two blogs, and join us for our Labor Day Has Gone South Party!
You can grab a great cocktail and appetizer over at my sister’s house:
and then come join me at:
For a great main course
and we'll wrap up the evening with a mouthwatering dessert on the
front porch!
And don’t worry about ringing the doorbell or knocking, just come on in…cause that’s how we roll in the South!
This recipe is linked up to:
