Gluten-free Gourmand

It's been an odd year for my garden.  A cool, wet spring met a cool, cloudy summer here in Portland.  It never even got over 100 degrees!  We finally had a couple of weeks of hot weather, during which my tomatoes really ripened by the dozen.  I'm not sure how much longer this will last with my tomato plants perishing and the weather cooling off again.  Every year it happens: I get tons of tomatoes at once, then I go the rest of the year yearning for them.  Here are some things that I do to prolong my tomato window. Pick them green If it's getting to be too late in the season, the vines are starting to rot and a frost is near, just pick them and bring them inside.  The green ones will ripen eventually.  One year I had tomatoes ripening in my kitchen until December. Dry them Linda of The Gluten-Free Homemaker has a great post on how to "sun dry" your tomatoes in the oven.  I did that last year with some tomatoes using her recipe...

This is a recipe inspired by my garden.  In the late summer, I often have an excess of tomatoes.  I created this recipe to make use of them, and it turned out better than I imagined.  All the flavors compete with each other to make a beautiful late summer meal with a Spanish influence. Ingredients: Olive oil 1 whole chicken, cut in 8 pieces 1/2 onion 10 oz. GF beer 1-2 lbs tomatoes 1 tsp cumin 1/2 tsp pepper salt to taste 1/2 Valencia orange, cut in wedges fresh basil to taste pitted black olives and juice Recipe: In a dutch oven or large non-aluminum pot, brown the chicken pieces on each side in olive oil.  Remove the chicken and set aside.  Brown the onions and remove them.  Add the beer to the pot and scrape up the brownings with a wooden spoon.  Reduce the beer to the desired thickness for the sauce. Heat the oven to 400 degrees F. Add the tomatoes, orange, salt, pepper, basil, olives with juice and cumin to t...

I try to always document this day in the year, mostly for my own reference.  Then, there's also that desire to brag a little.  This year, I'm not sure it qualifies as bragging, but I finally have my first ripe tomatoes. These are Sun Gold tomatoes, and they ripen very early.  If you consider August to be early.  Well, the point is that they ripen earlier than other varieties.  Last year my first ripe one was July 23rd.   The year before , it was July 17th.  I posted a Sun Gold tomato salad recipe on July 20th that year.  It has been a cold, wet spring in the west of the country this year.  Snow packs are still high, the weather only just turned warm, and tomatoes aren't exactly getting in early.  Here's a photo I took of Mt. Adams last weekend.  Look at all that snow! Not that I'm complaining.  It's always nice to have water.  Some of my spring crops are still going strong, and I have a ton of beautiful, huge sunflow...

It was a rough year for vegetable gardens here in the Pacific Northwest, but I'm finally feeling like I am reaping a good harvest.  I found myself in the vegetable section of the store today, realizing that I didn't have to buy a single vegetable, and I hadn't for over a month.  I stopped by my community garden patch later and harvested this: From the left, there are parsnips, a lemon cucumber, rainbow carrots, a big zucchini, a large crookneck squash, a chocolate bell pepper and some lemon drop peppers, which I've never had before but which are supposed to be spicy. We've been lucky to have temperatures stay pretty warm so far this fall so I'm keeping my tomatoes out until next weekend.  Here are some tomatoes I picked last week: The seeds strewn about are coriander. I'm not sure what to do with these.  It's not quite enough tomatoes to make sauce, but it's too many to just eat in salads.  Maybe I'll roast them to make sun-dried tomatoes...

To my faithful readers who have been patient with me, I'll finally explain why I took a long break from blogging. My grandfather recently died and my life has been in a bit of a frenzy with work, love, family, and a funeral. In memory of my grandfather, who loved this tomato sauce recipe so much, I am going to share with you my version of my grandmother's spaghetti sauce. My grandmother usually used a mixture of stewed tomatoes, tomato paste, and tomato puree from a can to make this. However, I have multitudes of fresh tomatoes from my garden to use for this. I have adapted the recipe to call for fresh tomatoes, which was probably the origin of the recipe anyway. You can use a food mill (pictured right) or tomatoes concasse as explained in my gazpacho recipe to make this. For ideal texture, use both. I chose to essentially juice my tomatoes this time, since most of my harvest was made up of small tomatoes which don't produce much flesh after skinning and de-...

Gazpacho is a great summertime dish. Gazpacho is a chilled tomato soup from Spain, where it's usually listed under salads on the menu. Although not all versions are gluten-free, this typical one is naturally gluten-free and vegan. If you're like me and you have plenty of garden tomatoes, this recipe is for you! Gazpacho I start out by peeling and seeding the tomatoes. I tried to skip this step once, but found that the tomato skins lend a weird texture to the soup. Some people don't mind the seeds, so you can choose whether you want to seed it or not. Here's the easiest way to do it: take a big pot and fill it with about 2-3" of water (enough to cover the tomatoes). Set to a boil. Cut a small X in the bottom of: 2 lbs tomatoes When the water is boiling, put the tomatoes in. Boil for 30-60 seconds. Drain, rinse with cold water, and drain again. The skins should be well-split. Set the tomatoes aside to cool. In a blender or food processo...

I should start calling this the Gluten-free Garden Blog. I'm continuing to be amazed at what my garden is producing this year. Last year I waited until the end of September to get any tomatoes - then some pests ate my first ones! This year I got my garden in much earlier, and voila! Tomatoes galore in mid-July. Here is what I harvested today: four lemon cucumbers and all these tomatoes of different varieties. There were Sun Golds, Sweet 100's, some romas (they are coming out very small) and a bloody Butcher (also small). There's also lots of basil and other herbs that are doing well. One of my tomato plants is suffering from blossom-end rot. It's an Opalka tomato plant. I'm planning on putting some lime down to combat it, but it's weird; the blossom-end rot is only happening on 1/2 of this one plant. All my other tomatoes are fine! Not that I'm complaining. How have you handled blossom-end rot or other tomato ailments?

Today I ate the first fruits of my garden . My Sun Gold tomatoes are ripening up quickly, and I just had to have a tomato salad with dinner. These orange tomatoes have a sweet and slightly tart flavor. The skins may be a bit tougher than other tomatoes, or that could be due to season or growing conditions. In order for my salads to pair better with wine, I often leave out the vinegar. These tomatoes are flavorful enough without it. Ingredients: Sun Gold or other tomatoes, cut into pieces or sliced Salt Pepper Pistou or other variety of basil from your garden olive oil Directions: In the order that they are listed, place the ingredients on a plate. The olive oil should be drizzled or spritzed over the top of everything, but I accidentally dumped it all in one spot. It was still delicious!

Gardening seems to be a hot topic among my friends and family these days. Everyone is comparing notes on how their vegetables are doing. I've had a few things just sort of fade away, but I consider my garden to be productive so far. Here is one of my mustard plants: Here is a little basil variety called Pistou Basil. It grows in a cute little bush, and it has tons of small leaves that are very aromatic: I'm growing cilantro from seeds: I bought this calendula (marigold) start at the farmer's market back in March or April and it became huge - about a foot and a half high! I couldn't believe it! My tomatoes seem to be doing well, and already have little green tomatoes on them. It's pretty exciting for me because last year my garden went in late and I had to wait forever until I had tomatoes. I'm growing a bunch of different varieties this year. The tag on this one says "Opalka." It's going to produce a dark red tomato with the shape of a chi...