Tomatoes, tomatoes and more tomatoes!

Being inundated with ripe tomatoes, I decided to try to make our own passata. Scouring the web, I found many recipes based around traditional passata days in Italian families. Some told tales of job allocation and producing enough passata sauce for the whole family for the year... serious business! My aim was just to make a yummy sauce easily.

Roasted two trays of tomatoes with garlic before transferring to the stove, adding in basil and seasoning then blending the passata smooth. It created two jars plus two snap lock bags (popped in the freezer) of passata - probably close to 1.5ltrs all up.

Two weeks later, with the weather about to turn (or so I thought.... last week was still hanging around 30°C!) Ella and I diligently plucked all the remaining tomatoes off the bushes before tidying up the vegie patch. The chickens enjoyed free ranging in the cleared patch.

We left the tomatoes to ripen in bowls on the bench. Soon there were numerous large continuers in the fridge bursting with ripe tomatoes so time to make another batch of passata. Producing 2.5ltrs of passata and no jars, I resorted to using zip lock bags and placing them in the freezer for use at a later date.

With the remaining 3kg of green tomatoes, I whipped up a batch of green tomato chutney ready for Grandad's next visit!