Sun Dried Tomatoes

At this time of year gardeners are anxiously awaiting for their first tomatoes to ripen. In a few short weeks many of them will be complaining that they have too many tomatoes and will be attempting to find ways to get rid of them, usually by giving them to their neighbors. I do not believe that you can ever have to many home grown tomatoes. This is especially true if you grow them organically without pesticides and poisonous chemical fertilizers. I make tomato sauce out of some of my wonderful home grown organic tomatoes and freeze it for use in the winter months. I expect that many of you do too. However, most of my excess tomatoes are sun dried and used to season the dishes I prepare throughout the year when fresh tomatoes are not available (store bought tomatoes are tasteless and don't count). This is a relatively simple and inexpensive way to utilize the excess bounty from your garden. By the way, have you noticed the price they charge for sun-dried tomatoes in the local food store? Outrageous! To sundry tomatoes you will need a drying rack. You also can use a dehydrator but dehydrators are expensive, costly to run and dehydrated tomatoes are not as tasty as are their sun-dried counterparts. I make my racks from 1 X 4 inch fir boards nailed together and covered with window screen on one side. The window screen is stapled to the 1 X 4 inch frames. The finished racks are 8 feet long and 3 feet wide. You will need two such racks for your drying assembly. Place one rack, screen side down on two saw horses, or something similar that will keep them off the ground, and position the second rack, screen side up, over it. The space between the two screens is 1.5 inches, just right for drying tomato halves! To prepare the tomatoes for drying cut them in half, through the middle, not the bottom where they were attached to the vines. Now make five or six right angle cuts across the exposed flesh of the tomato halves with a sharp knife so that they will, with a little pressure, lay flat on the drying rack, skin side down. Finally, salt and pepper the crosshatched tomato halves, cover them with the second rack to keep the flies off, and let them dry on the racks until they are nearly crisp and dark reddish black in color. This, usually takes about 5-7 days. If your nights are misty, cover the screens with a tarp at night to keep them from becoming moist during the evening hours. Sun dried tomatoes made in this way will last indefinitely if stored in a plastic bag or container. Sun dried tomato halves may be used whole or sliced into small pieces to season almost any dish imaginable; however, I usually run the dried tomato halves through a blender to form a dried tomato seasoning powder which I sprinkle generously on the dishes and salads I prepare in the kitchen. You may not like my politics, but you are going to love my sun dried tomato powder, I guarantee it!