Squeezing Yet Another Meal from the Garden

I thought I was so over chopping up plums but a suggestion in this weeks Economy Gastronomy, about using up over-ripe plums in a plum crumble, sent me back out to the tree this morning.  I managed to find approx a colander full of really ripe plums and chopped those up and cooked them.  What I ended up with didn't look quite enough for a crumble so I went back out into the garden and picked in a few more apples - which were also stewed up - and added to a small bowl of stewed apple left over from earlier in the week.  Now all the stewed fruit has been mixed together I think there should be a good sized crumble in the offing.  Of course, when I read the recipe for making the crumble topping I realised that I shouldn't have pre-cooked the fruit!!  I'm pretty certain I made the same mistake last year - what a twerp!  Although somewhere in the back of my mind I remember last year's blackberry and apple crumble being highly tasty.  We'll see - the proof of the pudding and all that.

I also made a roasted tomato and garlic pasta sauce from the tomatoes I've been picking in over the past week.  It was my Mum who suggested making the sauce this way (she read the original recipe somewhere in the blogosphere) and it was so simple - just chop up the tomatoes and place cut-side down on a baking tray add a few cloves of garlic and slosh over a bit of olive oil.  Cook on a medium-ish heat (I cooked them at approx. 175 for approx. two hours) until the tomatoes are soft, let them cool a little, place in a saucepan and blitz with a hand-held mixer thingy.  No need to skin the tomatoes - just chop it all up into the sauce.  I haven't tried it yet but the resultant sauce looks very tasty and quite professional.  I've just added a good pinch of dried basil to it as well as I do like a bit of basil with tomatoes.  We'll be having it on some fancy pants pumpkin-and-ricotta-filled-pasta which was on a special half-price offer at Sainsbury's.  Roll on tea time.

Comments

[Jennifer]

The crumble and sauce sound delicious. I would be excited about tea time as well.

[French Knots]

Mmm sounds like tasty tomato sauce. I've been watching Economy Gastronomy too, some of the people are just amazing the food they throw away and the money they spend thinking they are being frugal! Some of recipes look very tasty though.

[Lindsey]

I always cook the fruit first when I make a crumble. Enjoy!

[Shoestring]

Sounds gorgeous as ever. There's an award waiting for you over at my blog :)

[sharie]

The crumble sounds delicious. Don't forget to tell us if it was any good ;-)

[apieceofwood]

I've picked up so many tips from that show.. it's been great!

[Frugal Trenches]

hhmm....sounds wonderful!