Preserving: Freezing Tomatoes

Yesterday (Tiny Tomato Treats) and last October (Saving Green Tomatoes) I shared posts about how I handle unripened tomatoes when their vines have to come out. Wayne and I love the taste of fresh home grown tomatoes in salads including our favourite Chopped Garden Salad. But even with only a few plants, there can be more produce than we can consume all at once. I didn't have enough to bother with canning, so I decided to freeze my excess tomatoes.

Freezing tomatoes is very simple. You can do them whole, sliced or diced. You can do them with the skins on or off. Since I also had some remaining zucchini and green peppers, I decided to freeze my tomatoes diced (cut in half for the cherries) along with pieces of the other two vegetables. That way I could pop a container directly into the soup pot. You can use any tightly sealed container, but I purchased Bernardin freezer canning jars. They are plastic with tight snapping lids. They can also be saved and reused for the next season.

Denise, a blogger friend that writes the Vintage Log Cabin blog, shared a forum with me that is devoted to tomatoes called Tomatoville. You have to register to read and post messages, but it is free and a very busy community. Check it out, and stop by and meet Denise at vintagelogcabin.blogspot.com. -- Margy