eat make read

Man oh man, you can sure tell it’s tomato season over here. Tomato this and tomato that, I’m finding all sorts of was to use them. After making the incredibly delicious foccacia bread earlier this week, I had quite a few leftover tomatoes. I decided to follow Whitney’s lead and slow roast the remaining beauties using a super simple recipe from Orangette.

There are only four ingredients in the whole recipe, tomatoes, olive oil, salt and coriander, that’s it. All you have to do is sprinkle the tomatoes with the oil and spices, turn your oven on a very low temperature and walk away, preferably to a room that has air-conditioning. It’s a very slow process, we’re talking 5-6 hours, so hopefully you have other things that can occupy your time.

Once it’s been a good long while, peek in the oven and check on their process. Chances are the once plump tomatoes will be tiny and wrinkly. Perfecto! Pop one in your mouth and you’ll find a concentration of tart tomato goodness enhanced by the coriander. But be careful because these little guys are addictive, although I guess there are worse things to be addicted to than roasted tomatoes.

Slow roasted tomatoes with salt and coriander
via Whitney in Chicago via Molly Wizenberg at Orangette

Ripe tomatoes, preferably Roma (I used grape)
Olive oil
Sea salt or Maldon Salt
Ground coriander

Preheat the oven to 200° Fahrenheit.

1
Wash the tomatoes, cut off the stem end, and halve them lengthwise.
2

Pour a bit of olive oil into a small bowl, dip a pastry brush into it, and brush the tomato halves lightly with oil. Place them, skin side down, on a large baking sheet.
3
Sprinkle them with salt and ground coriander—about a pinch of each for every four to six tomato halves.
4
Bake the tomatoes until they shrink to about 1/3 of their original size but are still soft and juicy, 4 to 6 hours.  Remove the baking sheet from the oven, and allow the tomatoes to cool to room temperature. Place them in an airtight container, and store them in the refrigerator.  If you want to freeze them, once they are cool, place the baking sheet in the freezer and allow them to freeze individually, then place them in a bag. This way they won’t clump up.