Roasted Tomatoes

 A kind friend shared a recipe for them yesterday on Facebook. Other years Liz and I have cut up tomatoes, heated them in a pot with herbs, run the result through the food processor, and frozen it for soups in the winter.

Tomatoes made that way are good. They taste fresh and sweet during the garden food deprived winter months.

However, the roasted tomato recipe sounded even better.

It just happened that I had a few tomatoes languishing on the counter from my little container garden by the door and even more on the vine. I was already doing squash for the freezer so I had a go at the tomatoes.

I'm here to tell you, they are amazing! I tasted a little and it was hard to stop. Even the juice is rich, yet sweet. 

I am delighted to note that there are a number of maters already orange out on the vines. They will be good to go in a couple of days.

Peggy and I also went down the driveway to pick oregano....or marjoram, depending on who you ask. We have several hefty patches growing there that Peggy's great grandma Peggy and I planted back in the day. It seems to like the stony, scrubby, ground down there better than the lusher, richer soil up here on the flat. I do grow some in a half barrel for summer cookery, but it rarely winters over when grown that way.

They are prepared by simply washing and cutting tomatoes, spreading them on foil on a cookie sheet, drizzling with olive oil and roasting for an hour at 350 degrees. (Ended up cooking them a bit longer as they didn't look as done as I thought they should) I actually added chopped fresh herbs (basil, orange mint and thyme) and a little garlic powder, as I like that mixture.

And, yes, when all done and cooled freeze for winter goodness.

I hope we get enough tomatoes to make lots more....

Food on the Farm

Yellow tomato sauce to freeze for winter

Red ditto

Bizzy Lizzie

Birdin' and Jammin'

When the weather radar shows big blue sunbursts of migratory birds taking off early in the morning, right within fifty miles of your home, it's a good time to go birding.

It has been amazing around here this week! I didn't think I was going to crack 80 species this year...so many common, counted-every-year birds have been absent. 

Swamp Sparrow, species #81 for the year

However, now that migration is really moving the yards are full of birds, just full. Picked up three new ones in the past two days, Black-throated Green Warbler, Prairie Warbler, and Swamp Sparrow, to crack 80 and even hit 81. I sure would like to see a record this year so i go out every morning at least for a few minutes.

And, of course, it is also the season of putting by. Three batches of grape jelly the other day and Liz is busy freezing squash and tomato sauce and such. Big pumpkins are forming up in the top garden, the last flowers are blazing. We use fresh herbs with a lavish hand. they are so good and soon will be so gone. I keep a few indoors, but it is a job to keep them growing.

Frost soon, alas.