[TomNJ]

Some 90% of my tomato production goes into sauce and salsa, the balance for tomato/bacon sandwiches and caprese salad. Kosovo is my staple tomato: large, tasty, meaty, early, and productive, typically averaging about 25 pounds per plant. I usually grow a few Brandywine Sudduths and experiment with various pastes, and these also go into the sauce, but this year I am going with all Kosovo. It checks all boxes!

My standard batch of sauce contains 60 lbs of tomatoes, half fresh and half frozen. The frozen tomatoes lose 75% of their weight in the form of water upon thawing and draining, yielding a sauce so thick you can stand a spoon in it. This is added to the fresh tomatoes after they have boiled down, thus reducing the boiling time for the total sauce by about 2+ hours and giving a fresher tasting, brighter red sauce. I do the same for the salsa. the fresh tomatoes get milled before the boil, and the frozen tomatoes get milled after thawing.

The final tomato sauce contains roasted garlic, basil, salt, sugar, and citric acid. Simple and tasty! The final salsa gets onions, garlic, and hot peppers along with basil, oregano, cumin, salt, sugar, and citric acid. All veggies and herbs are homegrown organically.

1st photo frozen tomatoes after thawing and draining. 2nd photo frozen tomatoes after milling.