Wednesday, October 12, 2011

cherry tomatoes



when planning our garden this year, we knew that we only needed one type of cherry tomato, matt's wild. it is a sprawling, unruly tomato that's so prolific it's almost ridiculous. the tomatoes are tiny but flavorful, and the plant is a little more resistant to blight and other tomato diseases than most.

we've had two frost warnings so far this autumn but neither really amounted to anything, so the matt's wild cherry tomatoes keep coming. this is not a bad thing.



last summer i was obsessed with local kitchen's cherry tomato confit. i made the recipe numerous times over the course of the summer and the fall of 2010. this year, however, i had not made it once. this past weekend i set out to remedy that.



i had plenty of tomatoes so i doubled the recipe.




our italian parsley is still going strong, sprawling everywhere in fact, so i was happy to snip a large bunch for this recipe. as for the other herbs in the recipe, i substituted our own dried oregano for the basil.



you need to set aside time for this recipe as the tomatoes are cooked at a low temperature for around two hours. my husband and i were getting hungry so i pulled mine out a little on the early side.



as i'm a southern girl, i spooned the cherry tomato confit on top of grits and added plenty of cracked pepper. i also love the confit spread onto a slice of warm homemade bread or as a filling in a grilled cheese sandwich. this time, i threw the leftover confit into a broccoli and cheddar quiche. also amazing. so many uses!

thanks local kitchen!

4 comments:

  1. sounds delicious! we had matt's wild in our garden last year, but i didn't start anything from seed this year, so we missed out. i will definitely grow matt's again next year.

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  2. I, too, am a Matt's Wild afficianado. Did you know that they really will grow "wild?" I've had a Matt's Wild volunteer plant in my driveway for the past two summers.

    Like you, I've been slow on the uptake with the confit this year: but in the last few weeks I've made 4 batches. It does seem to be taking longer this year; I'm roasting for 3 or 4 hours. All this wet weather in New York, I guess. But it's glorious when it finally comes out of the oven. Of course, it could be that I'm ravenous by then. :)

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  3. I think I'd like to try that on grilled cheese, thanks Shari. And I need to remember to buy grits!

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  4. oh, this sounds so good. we made cherry tomato confiture for new year gifts. i cant wait to be able to grow all my own veggies.

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