Saucy Tomatoes

I know, I know I've posted about tomatoes twice before (!) but I just can't help myself.  It's tomato season again (hallelujah) and that means time to make tomato sauce for the freezer.  Every year we plant at least a dozen sauce tomato plants, usually either Roma or San Marzano tomatoes.  And every year Paul would talk dreamily about the Milano Bush tomatoes he used to grow.  Somewhere along the way, he quit starting his own plants and couldn't find the seed for Milanos anymore.  Then, lo and behold, there it was, Milano Bush tomato seed in one of the seed catalogs this year.  Of course, one thing led to another and before you know it we're buying a whole indoor seed growing set-up so we can start our own tomato plants in March!  

I'm happy to say we were successful and planted 10 Milano tomato plants in the garden.  They are just starting to come on.  If all the tomatoes on the plants ripen, we'll have plenty of sauce this year.  

 

Today I made the first batch of sauce from the first real picking of the Milanos.  It really is easy with our tomato saucing contraption.

 I got two pints of sauce from this bunch.  They are in the freezer as I type.  Fresh frozen tomato sauce tastes like it just came from the garden when you use it.  It's definitely a staple around here.  So we get that tomato taste all year round!