HOW DO YOU STASH TOMATOES for offseason use? Roast them with herbs, then freeze the resulting goodness, says cookbook author Alana Chernila, for a wildly flavorful, versatile staple of year-round cuisine. She offered such recipes and tips to share.
In 2008, when I was shifting my life from city-dwelling corporate executive to rural dweller, I met Alana Chernila. We aren’t close in age—she was at that time a mother to two young girls—but I recognized in her right away some common essential elements.
The natural world was the anchor we were both intentionally gravitating back to—and we each were obsessed with having a well-stocked freezer and pantry (or else!). We were also both brewing books. Alana’s “The Homemade Pantry: 101 Foods You Can Stop Buying and Start Making,” has been lavished with praise from food luminaries including Mollie Katzen. She has since delivered the manuscript for her second book, “The Homemade Kitchen,” which arrived in fall 2015. “Eating from the Ground Up” came later, in 2018 (affiliate links).
It was a 30-plus-year-old farmers’ market in Great Barrington, Massachusetts—near where we both live—that guided Alana to become a cookbook author, actually. Alana started working at the Saturday morning market in 2008, a decision that proved transformational.
I’ll let her tell us about her life-changing moment—and about how she stashes tomatoes and more:
my q&a with alana chernila
Q. So my life changed in 2008, when I left the city to move north to the garden fulltime. And yours shifted that same year in the local farmers’ market. Tell us.
A. I’d had kids in my 20s, and tried out many different careers—but through a lot of it, I was working at our local farmer’s market, as a working member of Indian Line Farm in South Egremont, Massachusetts, one of the first CSAs in the U.S., helping to pay for my farm share.
I found that it was my favorite thing of anything I was doing: It was a revelation—“Saturday’s my favorite day.” And it was really because it was the first time I’d had an opportunity both to work with vegetables and to get to talk about them, and to figure out how to use them, and experiment with them, and I got to share that with everyone who was coming and trying to figure out how to cook their first garlic scape, and kohlrabi, and all those strange things.
Q. And you started writing as a result, too, right?
A. Yes, that’s really how I came to what I do: I started writing recipes in those first markets, and here I am. So this relationship with food—not just as a CSA member, but as a representative of the CSA at the farmer’s market—also really became the foundation of writing for me, too. I started a blog soon after, called Eating from the Ground Up.
And I started gardening at that time as well, so the early stories on the website were really me finding my way through the kitchen and the garden.
Q. So let’s talk vegetables: When you are selling them at the market–what do people ask about?
A. There are certainly some vegetables that everyone is comfortable with, like lettuce. Everyone knows what to do with lettuce. But people are so different—it has so much to do with where they grew up, or what their parents cooked for them. You’d be surprised how many people I meet who have never tried kale before.
Q. Still? Even though it has become the “it” vegetable?
A. But maybe they grew up eating black radishes with salt, in their Polish grandmother’s kitchen. It’s always a learning experience for me to talk with people about the vegetables in their lives that they’re comfortable with.
Definitely tomatoes are a place where people are comfortable—though the heirlooms offer new lessons. The garlic plant itself confounds people in any other form but the cured bulb, such as the scape, and the greens—that’s really fun to talk to people about.
Q. I saw something new a few years ago at a farmers’ market—not new to me as a gardener, but new to me as a market item: green garlic, or spring garlic. Some growers harvest some of their garlic crop before it bulbs up to the max.
A. Yes. Actually now when I plant it in the fall, I plant it denser than it can grow the next year—with the intention of actually thinning out my garlic in the spring, so that I can have green garlic, because I love it so much.
Q. That brings up a great tip: that you can do the same with onions. You can plant your onions twice as close, then harvest every other one young, before the main crop fully develops.
A. And those spring garlics and young onions are so sweet, and tender. I discovered it by mistake—by planting too tightly at first.
Q. You mentioned with tomatoes, that people are sometimes mystified by the heirlooms at the farmers’ market. Any favorites you love to show them?
A. I love the green tomatoes; I have a softness in my heart for them, such as ‘Green Cherokee’ and ‘Green Zebra.’ I talk about them a lot.
The ‘Brandywine’ is your stock heirloom, and widely available, and it’s just so reliably good. That’s usually the one I hand to people when they want to try their first heirloom.
Q. It’s tomato-glut time or thereabouts. But sometimes there aren’t enough at one moment for a whole batch of sauce, so I sometimes just bag them in the freezer, whole, and cook them later. But you have another tactic: roasted tomatoes for the freezer.
A. I wrote about it in the first book, as an alternative to tomato canning. I love canning tomatoes, but of all the things to can, I find it to be the most laborious. And like you I was finding myself with tomatoes on the counter going slightly rotten, or moldy, and thinking, “I have to preserve this right now,” but not having the time to pull out my canning pots.
The only key with the roasted recipe: It can’t be 110 degrees out when you do it, because it uses your oven, so it’s good for the late-summertime when the days are getting cooler.
I either halve or quarter the tomatoes, into manageable sizes, like what you would eat in a tomato salad. I leave the skins on. I lay them out, flesh side up on a parchment-lined baking sheet with a rim to catch all that tomato juice.
The fun part is that you can stop there, or you can add whatever herbs you have growing in the garden, or even some peeled garlic cloves. All of those wonderful things that go with tomatoes. Garlic cloves, rosemary springs, thyme, oregano—whatever you have. And then a little salt and pepper, and you drizzle a little olive oil, and make it look like a work of art.
And then put it in a 275-degree F oven, to slow roast them, for as much time as you have. Three hours is pretty good; five hours is better. You could even do it overnight, but no less than three.
Q. When it’s done—then what?
A. What you’ll find will depend on the water content of your tomatoes. Heirlooms tend to be fairly watery; paste tomatoes less so. What you’ll find is slightly shriveled tomatoes that have released some of their juice. Some will be even closer to sundried tomatoes.
I always do this with a wide variety of different tomatoes—because as a home gardener that’s what I have. So I end up with something slightly shriveled, released juice, a little bit dehydrated, caramelized at the edges. It’s totally delicious right away; you could just pour the whole tray over spaghetti right away.
Q. Almost a sauce?
A. Yes, you can add a little olive oil and use it like a sauce, or spread it on bread—it has all sorts of uses. But what I do to preserve the tomatoes, is let them cool a bit, then tip the tray into freezer bags [left], close them up, and flatten the bags to conserve space in the freezer. Later I take a bag out, and thaw it, and I can sauté an onion and add the thawed tomatoes and I have an amazing sauce. I can also put them in soup—or make an entire soup of them, with a little cream. It’s sort of my secret ingredient in the freezer. I make sure I have lots of bags of roasted tomatoes.
- [The original story from Alana’s blog on roasted frozen tomatoes, with more detail, is here.]
Q. I have always made what I call Tomato Junk—my universal solvent for future recipes, that I freeze, too—but I have never roasted the ingredients. I just cook them slightly in a pot first.
A. So you can think of mine as Roasted Tomato Junk—and they’re great for cooking beans, as well, by the way.
more from alana chernila
(Photos except tomatoes on pedestal from Alana Chernila, used with permission. Disclosure: Amazon affiliate links yield a small commission.)
Yummy! Roasting always make tomatoes so sweet!
Margaret this seems the best yet for tomatoes, used to do a lot of freezing and canning but find as I get older, not into that so much so this seems like a wonderful solution.
Thanks to you and your friend, really appreciate.
Easy and good..i love you!!!! I also have swam in a sea of tomatoes and seeds..this will be my go to recipe!!!!
I love the idea of roasting tomatoes before making sauce or as a stop gap between when the tomato needs to be used and making time to make sauce…This is a new thing for me and I love it…….Do you leave the skin on ?
I have found that dehydrating some is good too. It really concentrates the flavor, and I can store a bunch in Mason jars for use trhroughout the winter. Espacially good added to bread or pizzas too.
Good idea, and thanks, Kevin. We will be dehydrating at the workshop as well, garlic too!
When I have dehydrated tomatoes & put them in regular jars, they have blackened very unappetizingly. So i freeze them in bags after dehyradation. They seem quite dry (almost leathery) so what might I be doing wrong?
Just put a pan in the oven. Delicious on pizza.
LOVE,LOVE,LOVE roasted tomatoes! Planting my Roma’s next month,in central fl.
Happy almost-start to the season in Florida, Robin, and thanks for saying hello.
Roasting tomatoes is what I do at home for all the same reasons listed. The only additional step I do is run the finished product through a food mill to remove the skins and a majority of the seeds. I find the result is a bit sweeter. I freeze it it mason jars and give lots away as gifts. By far the best tomato sauce I’ve ever eaten. Yum.
So tempting and so timely.
There are trays in my mud room with 8 types of ripening tomatoes, picked over several days, just waiting to jump into the oven with some of my own cured garlic and mature onions. Wonderful possibilities! Thanks!
Very inspiring ideas for tomatoes! I’ve already canned some this month and instead of digging out the canner again; may just roast them. Thanks for the podcast with Alana.
Glad to see this as we’ve been experimenting with ways to put up tomatoes without having to can them. this looks great!
Would love to do this. Still waiting for my tomatoes to turn red. They got a late start this year. May have to make some pickled green tomatoes!
Hello Margaret: Need your advice. Finished roasting mostly Roma tomatoes (approx. 4 hrs.) with parsley, marjoram, garlic and olive oil last evening. Packaging them for freezer last evening and they almost turned to paste. If I were to make tomato soup, would I use regular tomatoes also? Thanks–I enjoy your website–lots of good information!
I agree on the green tomatoes. This is my first year with greens and the Cherokee and Zebra are both powerhouses, well behaved plants, and tasty fruit with excellent texture. I’ve got my first trays of the Roasted tomato sauce in the oven -using mostly Jersey Devils and San Marzanos. It smells D.I.V.I.N.E. I’m so done with canning tomatoes.
Sounds delicious, JJ! Nice to “meet” you.
I made these at my son’s in Ohio with ROMA tomatoes..so quick and easy. Did 2 trays at a timeand put some in qrt. Freezer bags and some in Gal. Bags. Love this method.
I used hardneck seed garlic last year for the first time. Should I reorder or use my own cloves. My owl is not working in my veg garden so I will get my toms into the oven. Great idea. Thanks, Joe
I replant the largest cloves from the largest heads (and use the others for cooking/eating). That’s how I “select” my own strain of what we cann “seed garlic” (the cloves you replant) that’s adapted a little better each year to my own garden conditions.
I want to try this as I have a lot of tomatoes and we’ve already put up dozens of jars. If I use garlic cloves will they roast as well and not get bitter at this temperature? Just want to make sure before I put it all together. Thanks!
Hi, Jill. The garlic will sort of soften and melt, not get crisp, but of course is depends on your oven (if there are hotspots) and how long you roast. You an always remove the garlic cloves — again, use whole cloves — partway through if you think they are “done enough” for you, then return them to he mix after the rest is done.
After reading about Alana’s roasted tomatoes I was inspired and decided to quarter and place my tomatos in a perforated grill pan and set inside my Big Green Egg smoker to dehydrate. As the heat died down, from what ever I had made for dinner that night, they slow cooked to perfection. I left them in the BGE overnight and in the morning ended up with the sweetest tomato pulp with just barely a hint of smoke to them. I filled half pint jars and froze them for pizza sauce this Winter. I am still at it!
For those who choose not to use oil, they still come out delicious without it. It seems silly to buy cold pressed EVOO (which is the best) and then subject it to heat which makes all oils unhealthy.
I use a baking sheet liner called super parchment which can be reused for years. It’s light weight as opposed to Silpat, much less expensive, and can be stored right on the baking sheet. After I oven roast tomatoes, I put the cookie sheet in the freezer. When the tomatoes are frozen, I separate the parchment from the sheet and slide the tomatoes directly into a jar or bag using the parchment as a funnel. Super parchment is made in the USA and distributed by Kitchen Supply Company (a kitchenware wholesaler). I buy mine at Mrs. Cooks in University Village in Seattle.
I see that Amazon carries them as well.
Hi Margaret,
Since I read this, I’ve been roasting Juliet tomatoes, then pureeing them and freezing in containers. I’m running out of freezer space, but still have lots of tomatoes to process. Do you think the (condensed) roasted tomato puree is acidic enough to safely can in a water bath? This method is the best yet: so much better than cooking them down in a big pot on the stove! Thanks for bringing it to us!
Easy and good..i love you!!! No longer in a sea of tomatoes and seeds..my kitchen thanks you!!!
A fantastic idea!
Love the tomato information!
Do NOT leave the tomatoes in the oven overnight!
I left two trays of them for about 6-7 hours at 250F, and they were 90% burnt to a crisp when I opened the oven in the morning.
Only do this when you can keep an eye on them.
Alana’s simple recipe for oven roasted tomatoes sounds like a wonderful way to preserve the lovely flavor for the colder months~definitely planning on doing this now. Thanks!
I love the idea of roasting tomatoes! Tomatoes are somewhere on my daily menu for as long as I can get them. Thank you for a great, and easy, idea.