Lots of tomatoes! + recipes

It's all about tomatoes lately at our house! Theyre in season now, and very cheap. We bought a lot at the souk, and then we were gifted even more by our neighbour, whose aunt lives on a farm and apparently had a very good harvest this year. So I've been making lots of tomato/marinara sauce. I'm also planning to make slata mechouia, which is a Tunisian condiment quite similar to salsa. 

I've used the tomato sauce as is in a pasta dish, and also made a scrumptious tomato soup. My husband and children aren't the biggest fans of soup (tell me you're north African without telling youre north African 😆), but they all gobbledit up, it was that good! Best thing is, the soup was beyond easy to make - that is, if you don't include making the huge pot of sauce. There was still a lot of sauce left, so I used that sauce to can. It's a bit work, but it's so convenient to have some jars of canned food at home. I love that it doesn't take up precious freezer space - while we do have a relatively freezer, there seems to be never enough space somehow. So if I can save space by canning instead of freezing, I'm happy to do so. 

I want to share the recipes, but as always, just take the amounts as a guide- just add less or more seasoning, oil, onions etc. 

For the sauce, I used about 2/3 bucket full of tomatoes, diced into pieces. This was all chopped before starting. Then I chopped 4 large onions. I sautéed the onions in a generous amount of olive oil, then added two heaped teaspoons of garlic paste and the seasonings: black pepper, paprika, parsley, basil, oregano, sage, and rosemary. I also added salt. Then I added about half of the chopped tomatoes, stirred well so the tomatoes would be mixed with the seasonings, and then added the remaining tomatoes, and stirred again. I then added some bay leaves. Then just let it simmer until enough water has evaporated (this depends on your personal preference, some people prefer thick sauce whereas others prefer the sauce to be runnier). Towards the end, I blended it shortly (on the lowest setting, my immersion blender has 5 settings), then let it cook a bit more. Keep an eye on it and stirr regularly! I made two of these pots of sauce. Perhaps I will even make more if we find/get more cheap or free tomatoes. As I mentioned, you can use whatever seasonings you like, even keeping it as basic as possible with just salt and pepper, so it's more versatile without a distinct flavour profile. 

As for the soup, I used about 2 cups of sauce, diluted with water and blended (in a regular blender which you use for making smoothies) until very smooth. I then made a simple white sauce, and added the tomato "juice" to that. The remaining sauce in the blender was diluted with more water - to make cleaning up more easy. I poured this in a small saucepan, added two vegetable bullion cubes (could have use real brothbut I guess I was lazy!) and about 2/3 cup of vermicelli. I let this boil until soft and then added it to the soup. Easy but delicious! I served the soup with homemade dinner rolls and egg salad. These kind of meals are among our favourite; simple yet delicious. 

Rescuing foods - produce edition

Here's a few tips to save your produce from spoilage. Of course it's better to plan everything perfectly in advance and try not even to come near that stage, but sometimes life comes in the way. Fortunately, there are still ways to rescue produce, even when that doesn't seem to be a possibility. 

Carrots 🥕: softened carrots can be firmed up again by soaking them in water for as long as needed. The softer they are, the longer they need to soak. As we're speaking, I put some carrots to soak that had become way too flexible. They soaked overnight and are firm again! 

Tomatoes 🍅: spots need to be removed obviously. Our cat loves tomatoes and gobbles it up as if it were meat. So spotted tomatoes become cat food in our house! Tomatoes that aren't ripe enough (think green tomatoes) can be used in a variety of ways, I read some about a green tomato chutney, but never tried that myself (I have never come across unripe tomatoes here honestly, but I know it's a common problem for gardeners at the end of the season). 

Cucumbers 🥒: Like carrots, they can become flexible too. Especially the breed of cucumbers they sell here, which is a bit different from what I was used to in the Netherlands. If the soaking trick doesn't work, I usually just cook them. They resemble cooked courgette in taste and texture. This is also an idea to use up accidentally frozen cucumbers. Even if you don't have to "rescue" them but you've become bored of eating raw cucumber day after day, it's still nice to get some variety and cook up yourself some cucumber. 

Lettuce 🥬: The most common problem with leafy greens and especially lettuce is probably wilting. Rconsidering the way of consuming it isn't restricted to cucumbers, and I have added lettuce to soups and stews. Of course, you won't end up with a lot, so unless you have a massive amount of lettuce, don't use it as your main ingredient. It really does give some extra flavour to many dishes - you can use it in place of using spinach, kale, chard or whatever leafy greens you're used to. If you insist on eating your wilted lettuce raw, you can firm it up a bit with ice cubes. 

Potatoes 🥔: Just like carrots, softened potatoes can be soaked in water to make them more firm. 

Apples 🍎: I must admit that I'm not the biggest fruit lover in the world. And while I eat apples, if there's something I especially hate, it's softened apples. It's like biting into a sponge or something 😬 A few days ago we had some soft apples again. While I will absolutely not eat them as is, I don't mind cooked apples. So, I cut off the bad spots, cored them and cut the apples into small chunks. It was a great addition to my oatmeal porridge, and a dash of cinnamon made it extra nice. If you have more apples, making applesauce is a great idea too. But I had just three small ones, with quite a few spots, so cooked chunks of apple it was. There are many other ways to use up soft apples. You can add them to cakes, muffins, make apple crisp, apple bread, even stews...  There's so much to choose from really, there is just not an excuse for tossing that soft apple. (OK sometimes there is... But I'm talking about normal situations lol)

Watermelon 🍉: Sometimes they sell watermelons here that are not that tasty. What to do with a bland watermelon? I have used them for making cold soup, smoothies (sometimes it was just "juice" of watermelon, some sugar and water), even for making jam/syrups. I also tried to dehydrate watermelon, which was quite a fun project, which the kids loved because it was basically just turned into candy! And you can even fry watermelon- it's a bit like a fish/meat replacement for sushi (of course, it can be served in any way but apparently some vegans use it for their sushi). Yes, watermelon is very versatile. And remember not to toss the rinds as they can be cooked (and used as a vegetable), as well as fermented or pickled. 

Bananas 🍌: especially during the summer, Bananas ripen fast. But fortunately, baking with bananas is really good- some people buy bananas on purpose for certain baked goods. They make a great egg replacement and give a very nice flavour overall. In some cuisines, bananas are being used in savory dishes too. My Somali friend from the Netherlands always had a banana as a side with her dinner. If you're having banana with your dinner, a few spots aren't as annoying as they are when eating them as is. 

Melon 🍈: we once bought a melon that appeared to be bland and also not soft enough. I cooked it up and made "pumpkin" soup with it. No one noticed it was melon and not pumpkin. 

These were just a few types of fruit, but all fruit in general can be frozen and used for smoothies. 

Courgettes/zucchini: if it's a bit too bland (usually when it's a massive one from the garden), you can make "mock pineapple", make courgette muffins, or add it to dishes in which it isn't the main ingredient. 

Lemons 🍋: if it's starting to become a bit dry, why not dehydrate the lemon altogether? Dehydrated lemons (also known as black limes) make a perfect addition to many middle eastern/central Asian dishes. 

This was all I could think of right now... Possibly this post will be edited when I come up with more ideas. 

Was my grandmother rebellious?

We just opened our last jar of homemade, home-canned apricot jam. Jam is one of our favourite bread toppings and I love making my own. There's an abundance of fruits here during the spring/summertime, and apricots are just one of the many fruits that we make jam with. This is what my grandmother always did; even though the fruits available for her were a bit more limited, as apricots aren't native in the Netherlands, so she probably just used strawberries, raspberries, rosehips, or prunes. Either way, making jam was one of the things she always did during the summer. Even my own mother did this a lot (even though in the 1990s, store bought jam became the norm). There was a huge field near our house where we'd pick gooseberries and blackberries, with permission of the orchards owners, and then she made a big supply of jam which lasted quite a while. We also grew strawberries in the garden some years, but I can't really remember whether my mum turned those into jam. 

Not only is this a fun thing to do -for me anyhow-, I also think it's important to learn the old fashioned ways of preserving foods and re-learning old fashioned skills that are nearly forgotten. With all the insecurities people face these days, it's good to have a food supply that will last when you're having a financial tough situation. And it's just nice to know how to process your produce yourself, if your neighbour gifts you a massive amount of fruit that you at least know what to do with it (that happens so often here!). It's also a good way to save money. All these skills combined is probably what makes people admire grandmothers in general, and which is the very reason why people talk about "granny hobbies"... I found out a bit too late that this really is a thing, and if it weren't because of social media, I probably still wouldn't have a clue about it. And I actually have quite a few "granny hobbies".

The thing is, however, that while some people are romantizing their grandmothers lifestyles, there's something I just don't really get. And that is the way how most of our grandmothers did their canning, is suddenly labelled as "rebel canning". I don't know if this is another social media fad, but all I do know is that some people are going overboard with certain aspects of food safety. This means that not only my grandmother's method of the canning itself is not "approved", it's even the kind of jars she used- apparently Weck jars aren't considered safe enough, despite everyone used them for decades. Heck, in Dutch we even say "wecken" which simply means "to can", referring to the old trusty Weck jars... What I don't really get is that the reason for some people to home-can is because a lack of trust in the way the industry is preserving and processing foods -something I honestly get, but then going overboard when it comes to food safety when processing yourself. 

Let me be clear- I'm not claiming this is the absolute truth, or that you should start to "rebel can" if that makes you uncomfortable. But I honestly trust my grandmother more than any official government guideline, and if that makes me rebellious, so be it. Who would have thought that rebellion, in 2024, means canning food the way your grandmother did? 😃