The Slump July 1, 2013

Fresh Green Beans

I’m in a cooking slump. Nothing sounds appealing. Even the scrumptious dessert recipes I have been purusing can’t entice me into the kitchen. Aside from a dinner last week of green beans fresh my garden along with sauted zucchin, squash, onion, and pepers, I can barely stand being in the kitchen. The fact that all of the fresh veggies come in during the heat of summer, when turning on the stove turns the kitchen into a sauna is maddening.

 

I wonder if a cooking slump is like a writing slump. When I get in a writing slump, I struggle to get a handful of words on the page, but if I keep at it, eventually the wall comes down. Maybe if I spend time in the garden, trimming the dead leaves, removing the worms, pinching the flowers off the herbs, then I will find inspiration to cook again.

 

I suppose all I can do is soldier on, taking comfort in the promise of cooler weather in a few months, and a file of new recipes awaiting my return.

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Not Quite Sun-Dried But… June 17, 2013

Last summer I made salsa with my bounty of Roma tomatoes. This year, the Romas aren’t doing so well. I went with one Roma and one Heirloom plant this year and it seems like there must be something wrong with the soil where I had the Roma because the Heirloom is giant and has tons of fruit. I have to fight the raccoons for the Heriloom tomatoes, even pulling them before they are fully ripe.

My tomato thief

I do still have more than I can eat alone though, so I decided to try something new. I cut up all of the nice, ripe Romas I had in the fridge and laid them out on dehydrating racks. The book said it would take about 10 hours for them to be completely dry, but I had several stubborn slices that took closer to 18 hours. It’s amazing how a dozen or so tomatoes now fit into a quart size jar.

One Day in the Garden

The process was incredibly easy, just dip the tomato in boiling water for a minute to loosen the skin, peel, slice and place on the rack. It probably took me 30 minutes to do this, then I plugged in the dehydrator and went on about my day. I will most likely do this again in a few days when more of my Heirlooms are ripe. Hopefully the larger slices will fill more jars. I’m looking forward to not exactly sun-dried, but dried none the less, tomatoes in my cooking the rest of the year.

My first dried tomatoes

Related articles

• Heirloom Tomato Salsa Fresca (williams-sonoma.com)
• All About Heirloom Tomatoes (williams-sonoma.com)
• Sun Dried Tomato Pesto (cookinginsens.wordpress.com)
• Home-Grown Tomatoes… (nolagirlatheart.wordpress.com)