A glut of tomatoes and my first zucchini

What a fantastic response so far to my Garlic give-away....the seeds are drying slowly...but there is still time to get in on the action and be a contender for some of the seed, or maybe even the clove of garlic...You never know, and I always say..."You have to be in it to win it!"
* There's also another give-away coming soon for the celebration of my first year of blogging...but you will need to wait a few weeks to see what I have planned for that one.

So...what did I do with my first zucchini? I added it to a batch of preserved tomatoes....This is actually a recipe I made up along the way for a 'ready made tomato base'....you know...for those crazy nights...When you really just have time to brown some mince...or boil up a batch of pasta.....This will be great to have in the store cupboard....It's actually turned out so well...I plan to make more...next time maybe a bit spicier though...and with more garlic.

This all began because I had sourced a 10kg box of Roma Tomatoes for $9...I wish now I had gotten two boxes...one for this, and one for relish...but I'm sure there will be more tomato bargains in the near future.

So firstly...I quartered most of the box of tomatoes (four trays in total).....and tossed some lovely fresh garlic cloves in amongst them....(no oil, and no salt)...along with some herbs from the garden...Baked them until the natural sugars began to caramelise slightly.....(sorry, no photo for this part)

I then put it all in the crock-pot to cook slowly...due to time restraints and energy levels...I wasn't really ready to cook this up after chopping all the other vegetables....but I did chop up the following:

• My first eight-ball zucchini....(my first zucchini of any type) which hubby said looked more like a cannon-ball due to the size....lol
• Another long zucchini gifted to me by Lee and Alison...
• A huge bunch of Ruby Chard (coloured spinach) stems from the garden...of all colours...Yellow, red, pink and the original......

The colour is from the ruby chard...

The beauty of this sauce is that my boys aren't that keen on the zucchini or squash varieties...but they love these sauces....


Now, seeing I had used all the spinach stems for the base I was making....I decided to blanch the spinach tops to be put in smaller blocks into the freezer.....for later use. Don't pour that lovely cooking liquor down the sink yet....but strain it, just to be sure there are no impurities left behind...then use the water as the base to the tomato recipe you are making....this is what I do anyway....no point wasting those nutrients....

         

Zucchini and Ruby Chard (Rainbow) Spinach

I also chopped up:

• 1 large red capsicum
• 1 large green capsicum
• 1 large yellow capsicum
• 6 carrots...which I finely shredded with my slicer......
• 2 kg brown onions

So that all goes into the spinach water to cook up................................

I then put the tomato mixture through my Moulix to remove all the tomato and garlic skins....and seeds.

When you have finished running it all through the moulix,
pour boiling water over the pulp to release more flavour...
and run it through the moulix again.

Adding both mixes together and adding some extra spices and herbs...then allow it to cook for another hour or so...no thickener is needed, because you just allow it to reduce to the thickness you like. This photo shows it about half reduced...

Pot it all up into sterilised jars....and process in a water bath for 45 to 60 minutes....Some went in the Preserving outfit......and some into recycled jars with old lids which were sealed in a  hot oven for 40 minutes.

2 from the oven leaked, so they went aside to be used first

Mum gave me advice to check for a good seal...Place a pencil across the lid and clip...if there is no gap...the seal has failed.....they were all concaved...so a good seal was achieved for all of these ones.

After all this work, and attending the gardening course for January....along with other weekend events....Sunday night was the perfect night to test out this base......So tea involved the following:

• 2 smaller jars of the tomato base
• 3 sliced up chorizo and quickly fried to release the spicy flavour
• half a packet of pasta....boiled on the stove
• a big spoonful of crushed fresh garlic...from the fridge 

Combined together to make a really delicious meal.....perfect way to end the weekend...

and yes! the tomato base is perfect!