We had them stop by our house to check on/pick the tomatoes on our 15 tomato plants. Needless to say, we came home to a bowl full of tomatoes.
As usual, I found exactly what I was looking for over at Smitten Kitchen ... easily one of my favorite cooking blogs! She had the most perfect, most customizable recipe I could find. So I went with it.
This recipe was adapted from the Smitten Kitchen.
What you need:
- about 4 pounds of tomatoes (they don't have to be pretty!)
- quarter cup olive oil
- 2 teaspoons minced garlic
- half of a carrot, minced
- 1 tablespoon minced onion
- 1 hot pepper (couldn't tell you which kind, we found the pepper plant growing the garden while weeding)
- 1 lb ground beef
What you do:
- First, you have to peel the tomatoes. This isn't something I have ever done before. I was concerned that it would be really difficult (it wasn't). All you have to do is boil a pot of water, then make a cross in the bottom of the tomato. Put the tomatoes in the boiling water for half a minute, then take them out a rinse with cold water. Peel and discard the skin. Easy-peasy.
- Depending on the size of your tomatoes, halve or quarter them. Remove and discard the seeds (this took the most time!). Because I don't care for super chunky tomato sauce, I blended them. I placed half of the tomatoes in the blender and blended on low for a minute or so. I removed those and added the rest of the tomatoes.
- While the olive oil heats in a saucepan over medium heat, mince the carrot. Combine the carrot, garlic and onion in the olive oil and cook for a bit (5ish minutes).
- Add the tomatoes to the carrots, garlic and onion and simmer on medium/low. 35 minutes is perfect.
- While the sauce is simmering, brown the ground beef in a skillet. Drain off any excess fat/grease.
- With about ten minutes left on the timer, add a half teaspoon of salt and a light sprinkling of basil to the sauce. Stir it up and allow to simmer a few more minutes, then add the ground beef.
- Serve over spaghetti noodles and enjoy!
No comments:
Post a Comment