Summer time is Tomato time

 

One of the best things about the summer is the abundance of fresh vegetables. And for cooks, tomatoes are at the top of the list.

Several times during the summer I will make fresh tomato sauce mainly to freeze to have available during the winter. The number of dishes you can make that incorporate tomato sauce are as varied as your own imagination.

The ingredients for making the sauce are simple:

Olive oil, garlic, onions and lots of fresh basil. Oh yes....ripe tomatoes.

Let's start there first. I suggest using Roma tomatoes because they have a high "meat to juice" ratio.

This is three pounds of fresh Roma's I bought at Whole Foods to use for sauce.

Step number one is to sauté one onion chopped, 4 to six cloves of garlic, peeled but whole in around 4 or 5 tablespoons of olive oil. After the onions have sweated about 5 or 10 minutes, set the pan aside and peel the tomatoes.

To Grate or not to Grate.......

Now, I have done this two different ways. The first way is to score the tomatoes on both ends and drop them in boiling water for 5 minutes or so then run them under cold water. This will cause the tomato skin to peel back and make it much easier to remove. The other method is to simply cut the tomatoes in half and use the course side of a box grater to "grate" the tomatoes which will remove the meat and juice and leave the peel! Sounds easy and it is, but it also tends to leave you with too much juice (See the first picture above) and other then the time involved with boiling the tomatoes, is not much quicker. So I suggest boil the tomatoes then peel the skin off. With Roma tomatoes you simply cut off the tops and bottoms (with larger tomatoes you will have to core them) and lightly squeeze the tomato to remove most of the seeds and juice then add them to the pot with the onions and garlic. Squeeze the tomatoes in a bowl to preserve the fresh juice in case you need to add more liquid to the sauce.

Put the pan back on the stove and add as many basil leaves as you wish! For this batch of sauce, I used 10 basil leaves, chopped to help release their flavor. I also added a tablespoon each of chopped fresh oregano and thyme and two tablespoons of chopped fresh rosemary from my garden.

At this point you simply sauté the tomatoes with the onions and garlic until the tomatoes are "stewed" and limp around 15 to 20 minutes on medium heat.

Now, if you are like me you want your sauce to be smooth so I use my Breville immersion blender to make the sauce smooth and creamy. If you don't have one then using a traditional blender, though more trouble, it will do the trick.

Here is where you need to tasted the sauce to adjust seasoning by adding salt and fresh ground pepper. Sometimes I will add one or two tablespoons of tomato paste to give it a little body. You may want to add more herbs. Be careful with the salt! Add what you wish a little at a time and let it cook in and taste again. Remember you went to a lot of trouble to get this far to realize you have put in too much salt! (Done that).

Here is the finished product! Believe me it smells as good as it looks.

Now most of this I freeze but I did save enough to have for dinner. And I decided to serve it with pasta and shrimp....

The simple way would have been to simply add the peeled shrimp to the hot tomato sauce letting them cook in the sauce and serve it like a shrimp creole. That is a little to heavy for my taste this time so I sautéed the peeled shrimp for dinner for two:

2 dozen small/medium shrimp
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons chopped green onions
1 tablespoon minced green pepper

Cook the pepper and the onions in the oil for a couple of minutes over medium heat then add the shrimp and cook until pink.

Spoon the warm tomato sauce on the cooked pasta and put the shrimp on top. Add fresh parmesan cheese and you are good to go!

 

 

 

 

What did I drink with that?

Well....you can go either way. The tomato sauce can handle red wine such as this Chianti on the left. The shrimp says white like the Burgundy on the right. So I split the difference with the Cotes du Provence Rose. Rose' wine says summer. Check out my earlier post on rose' wine.



 

 

 

 

 





The best burgers are the ones you make yourself

So.....yesterday I decided I wanted a fresh burger for dinner. So the only way to do that is make the burger yourself.

First you need to decide what meat you want to use for the burger. There are plenty of different opinions on this and my favorite is boneless short ribs. Great combo of meat and fat. The store didn't have any so I went to the next best which I think is chuck roast.

Now.......we have all had bacon on a burger and we have all had onions on a burger but I think the best way is to COMBINE the bacon and onion right into the burger.

Why?

Well......flavors are always better when they are cooked in rather then simply placed on top!

So as I ground up the beef I ground up the bacon and added the onion as well so the finished product included all three.

 

You may notice that the mix is dropping into a bowl resting on ice. I got this tip from the internet to help keep the meat cold. It's a good idea as it helps when making the patties.

As the mixture is falling into the bowl, carefully mix it with your hands to insure the three elements are evenly folded in. Handling the meat too much makes the patties tough.

Here is the finished product.

Another tip I picked up is the press a hole in the top of the burger. This will keep the burger from "balling up" when you cook it which helps retain the juices.

Believe me.....cooking the bacon and onion in the burger tastes way better then slapping it on top!

So here is the deal:

• Two or so pounds of whatever meat you choose be it sirloin, chuck roast, or my preferred boneless short ribs.
• One pound of thick sliced hickory smoked bacon
• One medium sweet onion (Vidalia is the best)

What am I drinking with that??

When most folks think of Beaujolais wine they think of the stuff that is sold around the holidays called Beaujolais Nouveau (also called vin primeur or first wine). It is usually from the lesser districts in the Beaujolais region and is typically only seven to nine weeks old. Like Thanksgiving, it is meant to be a celebratory wine to welcome in the new harvest. 

In 1985 the third Thursday in November was established as its release date which has become a cleverly hyped event here and around the world. The stuff is fun to drink and is usually gone within a month of its release and accounts for over one third of all the wine produced in Beaujolais.

Unfortunately it also overshadows the really good wines that are produced in Beaujolais.

Beaujolais wines are not considered to be nearly as "serious" as their cousins to the north (Burgundy) or their cousins to the south (Northern Rhone) They are lighter and fruitier.....more to be considered a Bistro wine which makes Beaujolais the perfect wine of choice for a burger!

There are three levels of Beaujolais with the best being the Cru wines. The term cru here does not indicate a vineyard as it does in other areas of France but refers to the ten villages in the appellation that have been given special recognition for their wine.
 (Note....the above information about Beaujolais comes from the great book by Karen MacNeil titled:
The Wine Bible.)

The wine we drank with the burgers is from Morgon one of the ten cru villages.

So that's it!

A great burger and a great wine for a perfect Friday night dinner!

So now what?

Too hot to play golf and so I got these great organic Roma's at Whole Foods so I'm making homemade tomato sauce this afternoon. If I get around to it I'll blog about that too.