You could do a lot worse than stepping away from the salad…

I’m feeling rather pleased with myself this year as I have grown tomatoes, I think for the first time ever. They’ve loved being up against the very hot wall in my little town house garden, and picking them has made me feel enormously accomplished. Eat your heart out, Tom and Barbara.

There’s a meme you’ve probably seen about the satisfaction levels of growing a tomato, and I can tell you I felt hugely powerful making my own tomato salad the other day with fresh herbs from my garden and sliced peppers and jalapenos wot I also grew.

But there are only so many salads I can eat, and it’s a very good year for tomatoes. RHS Horticultural Advisor Anne Adam confirmed this recently, saying “the hot, dry summer has produced a bumper crop for home growers.”

So what can you do with your tomato glut?! Here are some non-salad ideas…

Ratatouille

Not sure there’s anything else that tastes of summer quite like a good ratatouille. Loads of fresh mediterranean herbs and flavours, a great way to add a ton of veg into a meal. I cook mine for absolute hours until it’s falling apart. Not everyone likes it that soft, but hey. You do you. I’m not mad keen for the fancy layered versions – I want my veggies falling apart, peasant stew stylee. Herbes de Provence, fresh rosemary and other garden herbs like thyme, and basil torn in at the last minute. Billions of garlic and a touch of sugar with your S&P. I can – and do – eat this by the bowlful. Heaven.

Shakshuka

Simple, saucy, spicy… tomatoes, peppers, onions, cumin, paprika, and chilli make this nice and easy. Maybe harissa if you’ve got it. I add garlic to mine too because why the hell wouldn’t you? Keep it saucy, crack in those eggies to poach, and then a landslide of salty feta on top, that’s the way I like it. Crusty bread or toasted sourdough for the fat scoop, and in you go.

Tomatini

Alright, so this doesn’t exactly use up the tomato glut but it’s SO GOOD. I’ve tinkered with the recipe, starting out with the Gifford’s one, which I found too sweet, and after some trial and error, ended up with one I much prefer. Cheers!

Get your shaker, swirl with ice and chuck out. Add one or two fat sweet tomatoes (quartered) with a good few leaves of basil, juice of about half a lemon, salt, and black pepper and muddle like mad. Add a tiny dash of white balsamic OR a little bit of sugar syrup (it’s too tart with just the lemon but go easy). Generous slosh of vodka – I’ll leave that to you and your liver to discuss, but make it at least a double. Shake with ice and serve in a glass with salted rim. If you fancy jazzing this up even more, you could add some jalapeno brine (thanks Melissa for that idea).

Salsa / pico de gallo etc

What a wonderful way to add some limey zhuzh to meals using your tomatoes. Crunchy fresh vegetables, onions, fruits like mango and pineapple, exciting lime juice, coriander, chillis, Tajin… these are all excellent bedfellows. Whatever you add to your salsa / pico it’s got to be fresh, zingy, and eaten quickly. As if that’s going to be a problem. Yum.

Batch cook tomato sauce and freeze

I love doing this. Make your basic sauces and freeze for later in the year when summer feels like a long time ago. There’s your very simple marinara sauce – tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, herbs – and then a range of ways to develop. Make pomodoro, which is essentially the same but smoother and prefers fresh basil. Arrabbiata – the same, but with chilli flakes. Puttanesca, with chilli, anchovies, olives, capers… batch cook the sauce you love and whack it away for the future. You can also dig out the plain sauce later for jazzing up into another thing. Add beef for a bol, mascarpone for a creamy sauce, and so on.

Soups – cream of tomato, gazpacho, basil

Gazpacho for the hot weather, warmers for winter. Batch cook those and freeze them for darker days. Winter you will love summer you for this, later on.

Also – don’t forget you can just freeze your tomatoes. Just bag ’em up and chuck them in.

Tomato pie / quiche

There are some very weird tomato pie recipes out there. I know because I’ve been looking at them whilst writing this article. Apparently the South American one includes cheese and mayonnaise as a topping which I am assured sounds weird but bakes into a nice crust. I am going to have to try this – although personally my go-to would be goat’s cheese for this sort of thing. I do like a puff pastry sheet loaded with tomatoes and olives and basil and all that jazz too. For any pie situation though, the key thing is getting the water out of the tomatoes first, unless you’re using little cherry tomatoes, or sundried obviously. Slice them, salt them and leave them to drain, then blot them well. Otherwise you end up with a watery tomato mess ruining the pastry. Same for quiche, natch.

Tomato chutney

One of the best time-honoured ways of preserving your toms – whether you’re making green chutney, or sweet red one, this is always going to be a big winner. Again, you could salt and drain the tomatoes to reduce the water before cooking – or you could just cook for longer until it evaporates, but you’ll have less structural integrity. If you want a chunkier vibe, drain first, before adding to your already soft onion and garlic (if using). Use plenty of sugar and vinegar to make sure it keeps well. What you add to it is your own business – I like mine spicy. No surprises there.

Bread and tomatoes

Whether you’re looking at bruschetta, pan con tomate, panzanella, pizza – hell, even just a simple tomato sandwich with butter and salt, there are few marriages that offer such a range of options. Bash ‘em, smash ‘em, add garlic, olive oil, fresh lemon, salt, pepper, seasonings, croutons – and pair with any or all types of breads to make the tomatoes the stars of the show.

Tomato curry

I would say genuinely that pretty much all my favourite curries use a tomato base. Madras, Goan fish curry, jalfrezi, vindaloo, tomato dal – I could go on. Not only can you use up a ton in the cooking (and freeze your ‘gravy’), you can also make salsas and chutneys to go with.