A rag-bag of assorted tomatoes, baked with herbs then bottled in their cooking juices has been a boon this week, forming the base of a fettucine supper, a light lunch with green beans and sesame, and a midnight feast with fat, oily anchovies and green olives.
The tomatoes were roasted at a low temperature, hidden among sprigs of thyme and rosemary and whole cloves of garlic, under a deep layer of olive oil. Shorn of their skins and seeds, the fruits – green, orange and some halved cherry varieties – softened to the point of melting, bloated with the flavours of oil and herbs, and could have been stored for a week or more in the fridge in a glass jar. These, however, were gone within days.
A pot or two of preserved tomatoes is as useful to come home to as the remains of a cold roast chicken on a Monday evening. You can dip into the jar for an accompaniment to a pork pie or grilled slices of aubergine, or deliciously eke out a wok-fried supper of shell-on prawns. You can toss them with cooked sausages for a summer version of a traditional cold-weather hot pot, or use them at the heart of a stuffed baked red pepper.
The trick here is to make enough. The cooking time is long and it makes more sense to prepare an ample supply for a week or more than it does for one occasion. A large, full-to-the-brim roasting tin will make plenty to keep picking at meal after meal for several days. (Packed in a sealed pot, the confit makes a splendid office lunch.) You could halve the recipe for a single dish or two. The oil in which the tomatoes reside may need a while at room temperature to return to its usual glowing self – anything below 3C sends the oil into a sulk, but it soon bounces back. We made rounds of thick bruschetta and spooned the tomatoes and their oil over the top, but could just as easily have slipped them into the centre of a cheese soufflé as it came from the oven.
You can keep such preserves for longer than a week, but you do need to know what you are doing with painstakingly sterilised preserving jars and explicit timings, so I suggest this more as a way to use up a lot of tomatoes and have a week’s worth of bounty rather than a larder full of stored treasure.
And treasure it certainly is.
Tomato confit
Sterilise your jars with boiling water and let them dry naturally or use a spotlessly clean tea towel. I use either Weck, Kilner or le Parfait jars. The oil solidifies in the fridge, but will return to liquid form at room temperature.
medium-sized tomatoes 1 kg
cherry tomatoes 1 kg
rosemary 6 bushy sprigs
black peppercorns 12
garlic 8 cloves, peeled
thyme 8 bushy sprigs
sea salt 2 tsp
caster sugar 3 tbsp
olive oil 500ml
You will also need 2 x 750ml storage jars
Put the kettle on. Cut a small cross at the tip of each of the medium tomatoes and put them in a heatproof bowl. When the water boils, pour it over the tomatoes and leave them for 4 or 5 minutes. Remove the tomatoes from the water then peel and discard the skins.
Halve the tomatoes horizontally, then use a small teaspoon to remove the seeds. Place the peeled and seeded tomatoes, cut side up and tightly packed, in a roasting tin. Set the oven at 120C/gas mark ½. Slice the cherry tomatoes in half, but don’t skin them, remove the seeds with a teaspoon and tuck them among the larger tomatoes.
Push the rosemary, peppercorns, garlic and thyme among the tomatoes. Scatter over the salt and sugar, pour over the olive oil and place in the oven. Leave to bake for 3 hours, then remove.
Sterilise the storage jars, either by baking them or by pouring boiling water into them, tipping it out then leaving them to dry. While they are still hot, spoon in the tomatoes, herbs and garlic and pour over the olive oil and juices. Seal, cool, then refrigerate till needed.
Broad and green beans with preserved tomatoes
I say green and broad beans here, but you could use asparagus, peas or new potatoes. The point is to use the preserved tomatoes as a sauce for seasonal vegetables. Serve it as a light summer lunch with toasted sourdough or perhaps some pieces of bread, torn into rough chunks and fried crisp in a little of the tomato oil.
Serves 2
green beans 200g
broad beans 500g (podded weight)
sesame seeds 4 tbsp
preserved tomatoes (see above) 300g
Bring a deep pan of water to the boil. Top and tail the green beans and lower them into the boiling water, leaving them to cook for 4 or 5 minutes till bright green and just starting to bend. Drain them and dunk into a bowl of iced water to stop them cooking.
Let the water return to the boil. Drop in the broad beans and let them cook for 4 to 6 minutes depending on their size and tenderness. Drain the beans, then pop them from their papery shells.
Toast the sesame seeds in a hot, dry pan over a moderate heat, moving them around the pan until they are golden and fragrant. Put 3 tbsp of the seeds into a food processor or blender with the tomatoes and process to the mixture to a thick sauce.
Warm the sesame and tomato paste in a shallow pan. As it starts to sizzle, add the drained green beans and skinned broad beans and continue to let them warm through for 4 or 5 minutes.
Transfer the beans and tomato sauce to warm plates, scatter with the reserved toasted sesame seeds and serve.
Email Nigel at nigel.slater@observer.co.uk or follow him on Twitter @NigelSlater