All the beautiful, plump, juicy beauties in your garden or at the market are ripening.
If you take a walk to the Suva market, you will be amazed with the colours, sizes andprices of mouth-watering tomatoes.
But, come late August, many gardeners end up with a dozen or two tomatoes ripening on their kitchen counter, with dozens more and countless other tomato varieties ripening on the vine.
What are you going to do with all these tomatoes?
Too many tomatoes is not a bad problem to have, actually. But it can be daunting to find ideas on how to use them all.
Here are 28 ways to use all those extra tomatoes from your garden. While they’re at their peak freshness, no less!
Eat them whole
Ripened tomatoes are delicious all on their own. You can take a big bite out of one like an apple, or do what my mom always does — slice the tomato into thick slices and sprinkle with salt.
Fresh salsa
If you love Mexican food, tomatoes can be served with fresh salsa. There’s something about the fresh ingredients in uncooked salsa that makes it such a treat for the summer.
Surprsingly, you can clean your face with a tomato. The acids in tomato juice are great for softening and cleaning skin, while the lycopene helps eliminate free radicals.
For oily skin: mix equal parts fresh tomato juice and aloe vera juice.
For dry skin: use a ratio of 1 part tomato juice to 2 parts aloe vera juice.
Rub a tablespoon of this mixture into your face and rinse with warm water.
Sunburn relief
Tomatoes are also wonderful at soothing sunburn. If your sunburn is recent and not blistering or peeling, rubbing a slice of tomato on it can lessen the redness. According to this study, eating tomatoes can increase your skin’s natural sun protection. One more reason to eat those beauties!
No-cook pasta sauce
The last thing I want to do when it’s hot outside is cook something steamy in the kitchen. That’s why a no-cook pasta sauce is such a great way to use fresh tomatoes.
Simply dice up some fresh tomatoes, add fresh herbs like parsley, basil and oregano, add olive oil, lemon juice and salt
Tomato soup
What goes great with sandwiches? Soup of course! Homemade tomato soup is full of lycopene, which has been shown to fight chronic diseases and increase the body’s natural sun protection.
Homemade tomato soup is simple, healthy and easy to freeze or can.
Tomato juice
If you have too many tomatoes, making tomato juice is a great way to use them up.
Tomato paste
Tomato paste is one of the best sources of lycopene around. It can be used in many dishes and freezes really well, making it an MVP of tomato products.
Fried green tomatoes
What would you do with green tomatoes besides fry them?
How to fry green tomatoes:
Start with slices of green tomato and dip them in an egg bath.
Coat with batter of choice. Being dairy and gluten free, I use a mixture of cornmeal and another gluten free flour.
You could also add buttermilk to the egg mixture for an added level of taste.
Fry the tomatoes in your choice of oil (at roughly 375 degrees) until golden and crispy.
Tomato ketchup
Ketchup is an American summer staple, but the store bought kind often includes yucky ingredients like high fructose corn syrup. Making your own ketchup is a great way to use those extra tomatoes while keeping your family’s food as clean as possible.
Grill them
Grilled tomatoes are a fun and easy snack for when you have an abundance of fresh tomatoes.
Start with firm tomatoes and slice them in half horizontally
Brush with olive oil.
Grill until grill marks form.
Flip and repeat.
Top with salt.
