Friday, September 16, 2016

Heirloom tomato jelly - amazing!

I know, it sounds bizarre and more than a little ick.  Tomato jelly?  That's what I thought too.  But I am here to tell you that this is the most amazing, delicious treat ever.  I wish I could pass a jar and a spoon around the internet so everyone could have a taste.  It's sweet. It's spicy. It's vaguely tomato-y. It has ginger in it.  It is pretty much perfect.

So I was looking at a small pile of tomatoes on the kitchen counter yesterday and was wondering what to do with them.  It's the end of the season but we're still getting some here and there because the heirlooms ripen over a couple of months.  I've canned plenty of tomatoes and we're eating them everyday already so... what to do with this handful?  To the Ball Book where I found their recipe for Tomato Jelly. I don't see where they have uploaded this one to their website, but I have two different editions of the Ball Blue Book and it's listed in both.

It's so, so simple: tomatoes, pectin, crystallized ginger, salt, lemon juice, hot sauce (sriracha) and sugar. That's it.  A very, very minimal amount of effort later I had this:


That's a pretty accurate color.  It's beautiful.

I made this with cheese plates in mind, but it's going to get used on everything: toast, cheese, roast chicken, sandwiches, whatever. There was a baby food jar's worth left over and I stood at the counter and ate most of it with a spoon. I should make more, it's not going to last long.



4 comments:

  1. Not sure if I like the sound of this or not!
    have you ever heard of storage tomatoes? In Spain they grow varieties that are for harvesting and then ripening in storage up until Christmas. I might try them next year. here's link to a seed company I use http://www.realseeds.co.uk/tomatoes_vines_big.html And these tomatoes are near the bottom of the page called De Colgar.

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  2. Hi there. Found you off of Kev's blog above, Thanks Kev, and thinking I'll try to make some of that tomato jelly. I too have enough left over for a few more projects. Thanks for sharing, I'm off not to my Ball recipe book. Also signed up as your first follower. May many many more follow!

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  3. Kev, I'll have to look into those. It seems like you have access to so many wonderful varieties. I don't know if I've seen seeds for those for sale.
    Donna, thank you! I really hope you like tge jelly. You juice the tomatoes so it really is a light flavor. So good!

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  4. Mike's grandpa's favorite was tomato jelly! Mike said he had it every morning on toast.

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