We made tomato jam.
Our recipe was adapted from an Epicurious recipe. You might expect that tomato jam would be savory like tomato sauce or salsa, but it was much closer to fruit jams like raspberry or strawberry. Tomatoes are fruits, after all (I learned that from my second grade teacher).
First, we cut out the stems of all the tomatoes, turning the sharp knife in a circle to remove a sort of cone-shaped portion from the top of each one (Can you find the difference between the two tomatoes in the photograph below??).
Then we cut shallow, but large X shapes on the bottom of the tomatoes to make removing the skin easier (10 points if you can also spot the difference in this picture below).
All of the tomatoes went into a pot of boiling water for less than a minute. Then the skins could be removed easily. We cut the peeled tomatoes in half and squeezed out most of the seeds and juice (we left some seeds because we thought that made the jam look prettier in the jar).
Lauren chopped the tomato halves into small pieces and then we added them to a pot with the sugar, lemon juice, salt, and pepper, and waited for an astonishingly long time until the red, swirly mess turned into jam (we didn't post any pictures of the red, swirly mess).
This is Lauren's first reaction to the jam.
But it was actually really good. In reviews, other people had said you wouldn't know the jam had tomatoes in it if you only tasted it, without looking, but ours was definitely tomatoey, in the best of ways.
However, it was very sweet and next time, we'd try using about a half cup less of sugar. It really was delicious though. I had some for dinner last night on toast with ricotta cheese and garlic salt, and I think the salt complemented it quite nicely.
In conclusion, go make some tomato jam, but maybe use a bit less sugar than we did. You won't be sorry.
What I'm watching right now: The Long, Hot Summer
xo,
SF
& LA
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