We bought a chest freezer!

 We finally decided that it was enough borrowing space everywhere, and took the plunge. I had been looking around Kijiji, but opted to buy new under warranty from the Sears liquidation centre one block away from my house. I had to wait for about a month because they had no chest freezers in stock. They only sell old stock or slightly damaged goods for a discount. Also because they are so close to my home, I have negotiated when buying large items there to borrow a dolly and walk it home, rather than spending another $75 on delivery. That makes it a better deal than what I found on Kijiji, and it is brand new. We have already reclaimed tomato pulp from several friends, as well as added a bag of frozen beans and some green tomato pulp which will be used to hot sauce or soups later.

Last night Josh tried making a green tomato and corn soup. A friend of ours suggested this as a way to use green tomatoes, said it was Mexican. Josh doesn't need much inspiration, he did not even look up a recipe but whipped up a nice soup flavoured with chopotles, roasted red peppers, limes and who knows what else. It was a bit thick, and the kids were not looking too enthused so I suggested we cook some pasta as a back up in case the soup did not make a hit. Then I looked at the thick soup, and the noodles, and suggested we try it as a pasta sauce. We added some of our home made hot pepper sauce and some cheddar cheese, and it was different, not bad at all. Today I had some straight up as soup in my lunch. I added the cheese and hot sauce again, and it tasted even better than last night.

I spoke to my mom and asked if she had any green tomato ideas. She floored me when she said that the Joy of Cooking has an apple and green tomato pie recipe. WHAT?? She said that she has used their apple pie recipe for years, and it has a line in it about trying to cut half the apples with green tomatoes for a change. I had to see it to believe it. She has an older edition than I do, and my copy is slowly dissolving at the ends so my index did not go far enough for me to find the page. She walked me through page by page (after the croquenbouche but not as far as Cherry tarts) until there it was, the suggested substitution in the apple pie recipe. We decided NOT to tell the kids, and Josh will do a small apple/green tomato crumble to test it out. I guess lots of people have been trying to recoup green tomatoes (like they do zucchinis) by trying to find creative ways to sneak them into all kinds of things.

A bunch of the green tomatoes have spontaneously started ripening. Josh and I are continuing to process and freeze what turns red for this week, but I really want to avoid diluting my tomato sauce with flavourless pulp like last year, so we are taking on the green tomato challenge more seriously.

I would like to highlight the amazing productivity of the single brown cherry tomato plant which Nathalie gave us as a gift when she stayed here with her kids last April. Last Friday when we harvested what was left of the garden, we picked all these from a single plant. They are turning red faster than the San Marzanos so we are eating/cooking/processing them, so the picture does not even represent the full crop. One plant, one day. Wow!