Recipe: Use those late-season green tomatoes in a casual fall meal
![]() |
Got green tomatoes? Roast them to make a delicious sauce. (Photos: Kathy Morrison) |
At my community garden, I’m usually one of the last gardeners to pull out their tomato plants. One reason is I typically have three or four cherry-tomato plants still producing, notably the unstoppable Juliet variety. That one will carry on until frost if I let it.
But another reason is I grow a lot of tomato plants, and a few are so pretty and green again by October that I hold off turning them into compost. Not all of these set new tomatoes, but this fall the continuing warm weather prompted several to do so, including my Big Beef and First Prize plants. But I knew I was kidding myself about seeing many more red full-size tomatoes the rest of the year. So I picked most of them last weekend and hunted for a new way to use green tomatoes.
Now, of course, the cooler nights and the smoky skies are shutting down tomato production anyway, as Debbie detailed in this week’s Garden Checklist .
In the past I’ve canned a lovely green tomato chutney and a spicy green tomato jam, but I didn’t want to get out the canning kettle this time. Instead I hit on the idea of making a roasted green tomato sauce. Was there such a thing? An Internet search turned up a few variations, notably one on Genius Kitchen which I used as inspiration to create the Italian-style sauce here.
The resulting sauce wasn’t as piquant as I feared it might be -- the long roasting time and the additional of roasted white onions mellowed the flavor. Basil from my still-producing plants plus garlic and red pepper flakes added depth.
I tossed the sauce with potato gnocchi and served it alongside chicken Italian sausages, with an Amador County sangiovese to drink. Delicious, and a nice change from red sauce.
![]() |
Roasted green tomato sauce
Makes enough for 6 side dish servings
Ingredients:
Extra virgin olive oil, for pan and for drizzling
3 pounds medium green (unripened) tomatoes, about 12
1 large white onion
Salt and freshly ground pepper
3 to 6 fresh garlic cloves (I used 6, but I love garlic)
24 basil leaves, plus more for garnish
⅛ teaspoon dried red pepper flakes
Prepared potato gnocchi, polenta, or pasta of your choice
Grated Parmesan cheese
![]() |
Comments
0 comments have been posted.Sacramento Digs Gardening to your inbox.
Sites We Like
Garden Checklist for week of July 21
Your garden needs you!
* Keep your vegetable garden watered, mulched and weeded. Water before 8 a.m. to reduce the chance of fungal infection and to conserve moisture.
* Feed vegetable plants bone meal, rock phosphate or other fertilizers high in phosphate to stimulate more blooms and fruiting. (But wait until daily high temperatures drop out of the 100s.)
* Don’t let tomatoes wilt or dry out completely. Give tomatoes a deep watering two to three times a week.
* Harvest vegetables promptly to encourage plants to produce more. Squash especially tends to grow rapidly in hot weather. Keep an eye on zucchini.
* Pinch back chrysanthemums for bushy plants and more flowers in September.
* Remove spent flowers from roses, daylilies and other bloomers as they finish flowering.
* Pinch off blooms from basil so the plant will grow more leaves.
* Cut back lavender after flowering to promote a second bloom.
* It's not too late to add a splash of color. Plant petunias, snapdragons, zinnias and marigolds.
* From seed, plant corn, pumpkins, radishes, winter squash and sunflowers.