Roasted Plum Tomatoes

Roasted Plum Tomatoes ready for the freezer.

I've done my share of canning plum tomatoes, and if you've done it, you know it's an all day event to sterilize your kitchen, every jar and lid, and all the utensils. Then after you cook the tomatoes you put them in the jars and preserve them in a water bath. It's a lot of work, but to have summer tomatoes at your disposal in February, it is pretty much wroth it. That is until someone -- like lazy me -- finds another way.

One day I didn't have enough plum tomatoes around to make canning worth while so put them whole in a glass baking pan, drizzled some olive oil on and then roasted them. Thanks to a spare freezer in our basement, this is my new way to preserve the summer taste of tomatoes for the dreary winter months.

The beauty of this method is its simplicity. Once they are in the oven, there's nothing to do but find some other rabbit hole until it's time to put them in freezer containers.

Plum tomatoes ready for roasting

Fully roasterd plum omatoes

Skins removed

Ready for the freezer

THE RECIPE

Ripe plum tomatoes

Olive oil

Dried Italian herbs (optional)

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees

• Place a single layer of whole tomatoes in a baking dish

• Drizzle some olive oil over them and shimmy the dis back and forth so the tomatoes roll around to get better coated with the oil.

• Cover tightly with foil and bake for an hour or until the skins are blackened and blistered.

• Keep an eye on them so all the liquid doesn't simmer completely away.

• When the tomatoes cool a bit, transfer them to freezer worthy containers.

• If you like, you can sprinkle some dried herbs before closing them up.

• Label and date the container and once it's cooled in the refrigerator, transfer to your freezer.

When you want to use the tomatoes, simply thaw and incorporate in whatever recipe you're preparing. If you need skins off, they literally slide off once the tomatoes are thawed.

FYI, I bought a package of 50 of these take-away containers from Amazon. They are freezer, microwave, and dishwasher safe, they stack well when storing, and if I give them away I don't fret about getting it beck.