September 7, 2005
The versatile roasted-tomato freezer sauce
A Fresh Approach
By JAN ROBERTS-DOMINGUEZ
For the Mail Tribune
It’s a conundrum. To describe my roasted tomato freezer sauce without waxing poetic would be an injustice. And yet, to do so risks putting off hesitant cooks instinctively mistrustful of
hyperbolic food writers.
So let me just say this: Roasting fresh summer tomatoes with a bit of olive oil, some fresh herbs and a fistful of garlic is a brilliant maneuver. Trust me. The tomatoes come out beautifully bronzed on
the outside, with a concentrated, tomatoey flavor oozing from their softened innards.
The flavorful melange is a cross between a sauce and a filling. Chunky yet velvety. I pack each batch into freezer bags and am able to sustain a state of smug gratification for as long as my supply
lasts, usually into April.
There are so many ways to use this special mixture. It can be a base for a quick pasta sauce, a topping over roasted polenta or a savory filling for omelettes and lasagne.
My friend Chris Peterson has been doing the same thing for several years: banking her flavorful cache in the freezer to maintain her summer-quality cooking all year long.
Like me, she roasts her harvest until there is no more to harvest. So by the end of the season, Chris figures she’s squirreled away several gallons worth of sauce. Or filling. Or soup base. Or
whatever you want to call it.
"I use the big square roasting pan that came with the oven," she says. "I spread a little olive oil on the bottom, cut tomatoes in half — slicer, paste (the best!) and cherries
— whatever needs to be used up. I toss in a handful of peeled garlic cloves and some herbs (fresh rosemary, basil, or cilantro), drizzle more olive oil over them, a little salt and pepper and
roast at 400 to 450 degrees for 20 to 30 minutes."
She goes more by sight than time, waiting until the tomato skins are turning blackish.
"Yet the rest is still juicy and the fragrance has our mouths watering," she notes.
In the Dominguez household, the roasting sometimes takes place out on our deck in my grill, over indirect heat, with the lid on.
So even on the hottest days of summer, I can be roasting without heating up my kitchen.
Chris has created yet another option. It’s a little time consuming, she warns. But to anyone who has pondered whether to leave the tomato skins on or fish them out of the sauce before freezing it,
she has a wonderful solution: "After roasting, I pluck all the skins off (they peel off with ease) and put them in the blender or food processor along with some of the juicier liquid and most of
the roasted garlic cloves, then whomp it up and pour it back into the pan with all the other stuff."
I’ve approached the skin issue from the other direction. Earlier this summer, I decided to find out if peeled tomatoes would roast up just as nicely as unpeeled tomatoes. Well, they do. The
resulting mixture is just as intensely flavored as the skins-on version, and produces a smoother sauce. Or topping. Or filling.
So while tomatoes and all the other savory offerings of summer are here, consider filling your freezer with a substantial supply.
As Chris says, "Most anything that calls for tomato sauce will be boosted into outer space with roasted tomato sauce."
VARIATIONS AND TIPS TO CONSIDER:
There’s a fun and free-wheeling aspect of preparing a batch of roasted vegetables for the freezer. Specific recipes aren’t nearly as useful as listening to your inner cook. For instance,
my friend Chris’s latest spin-off involves eggplant. She had roasted a lot of it, "which leaves a horrid mess to scrape out of the pan," she says.
"But I decided to roast the tomatoes right away. The juice from the tomatoes worked all that flavorful black stuff up into the tomato sauce."
It added depth and texture to her basic mixture. Sheer genius. Now she’s contemplating a roasting of eggplant, tomatoes, carrots and onions.
To peel or not to peel? It’s up to you. If you plan to puree the mixture once it’s been roasted, then don’t bother dealing with the tomato peels, because they will disappear once
they’ve been subjected to the blender or food processor. That’s especially true if you’re using cherry tomatoes.
With some of my batches I like to leave the vegetables in large chunks so I have more options for use in the months ahead. If I don’t want pieces of peel in the mix, it’s easy to simply pluck
them out of the sauce after thawing.
These tomato-based roastings are wonderful soup- and stew-starters, so when packaging for the freezer, consider appropriate amounts for such options. The other thing my friend Chris likes to roast
and freeze for a soup base is green beans, "with onion slices, garlic, basil or rosemary, and (of course!) olive oil." She freezes the mix in quart-sized yogurt containers and says they make
divine cream soups in winter.
Another wonderful combination is simply a roasting of whole garlic cloves (Don’t be shy! I use at least 2 cups worth) and tomatoes with a bit of olive oil, salt, and pepper of course. They
both get tender and sweet in just about the same amount of time and can be used chunky as they come out of the oven, or pureed into a garlicky/tomatoey seasoner. Fresh herbs, such as basil, rosemary or
oregano can also be included, but that will limit uses down the road.
Mushrooms make another great addition, but because they release a lot of moisture during cooking, I like to give them a head start in the oven (or on the grill) before adding all of the other
vegetables.
For an extra zip, glug in a bit of balsamic vinegar during roasting. It adds depth and oomph.
Storage containers: I like to pack my roasted mixes into quart and gallon-sized recloseable freezer bags because they store nice and flat during freezing and thaw within an hour in a bowl of hot
water (with a smaller bowl of hot water nestled on top to keep the bag submerged). For a more frugal and ecologically sound approach, copy my friend Chris and use up your clean yogurt and cottage
cheese containers.
Jan Roberts-Dominguez is a Corvallis food writer, cookbook author and artist. Readers can contact her by e-mail at janrd@proaxis.com.
Jan’s roasted summer tomatoes:
About 2 pounds tomatoes, cored and halved, quartered, or cut into 1-inch cubes (to measure 4 cups) 1 large Walla Walla Sweet onion, peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks ½ cup coarsely chopped
basil 8 or 10 cloves of garlic, peeled About ¼ cup olive oil About ½ teaspoon salt About ¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper Prepare the tomatoes as desired.
If using cherry tomatoes, simply remove the stems and halve each one. Place the tomatoes in a large roasting pan, jelly-roll pan, or any baking sheet with sides. Add the onion, basil, and garlic.
You can crowd the vegetables together, but don’t go beyond a single layer. Drizzle on a bit of olive oil, and then sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste.
Roast in a preheated 375- to 450- degree F oven (the hotter the oven, the shorter the roasting time) until the tomatoes are turning golden on their skins.Depending on your oven temperature, this
will take anywhere from 20 minutes to about 90 minutes. When done, they will have collapsed and look quite wrinkled. Alternatively, consider roasting the vegetables over indirect heat on your
grill, with the lid on. I have a wood pellet-fed grill (it’s called a Traeger and is built in Mount Angel, Oregon), which provides a wonderful smoke flavor to the vegetables.
Remove the roasting pan from the oven or grill and let the vegetables cool. With a metal spatula or wide, flat-sided wooden spatula, stir and scrape the cooled tomatoes to dissolve all of the
cooked-on bits of food. Scrape the tomatoes into the work bowl of food processor and process just until almost completely smooth (with a few chunks remaining). Using 2½ pounds of tomatoes
(8 medium-sized) with the garlic cloves and onion yields about 3 cups of sauce. To freeze, ladle the sauce into freezer containers, leaving about 1-inch head space. Let cool completely, then
attach lids and freeze.
NOTE: Here’s the Chris Peterson skinned variation: After roasting, pluck all of the darkened skins off the tomato flesh (it comes off easily). Place them in a blender or food processor along
with a healthy glug of the liquid from the roasting pan. Blend on HIGH until the skin is a puree. Stir this mixture back into the vegetables before refrigerating or freezing.
NOTE: Here’s the Jan Roberts-Dominguez skinless variation: To remove the tomato skins before roasting, bring a large pot of water to a boil. Cut a shallow "X" in the bottom of each
tomato. Blanch them in the boiling water for about 30 seconds (just until the skin begins to peel away), then remove with a slotted spoon and run under cold water to cool. Peel the skins off the
tomatoes, then core and cut into halves, quarters, or 1-inch chunks and proceed with recipe.
