I've frozen the suckers whole, in zip lock bags. Just wash and freeze! When
I need tomatoes for a recipie, I take a bag out, put the frozen tomatoes,
sans bag, into a collander and run hot water over them. The skin peels right
off and you can use them whole or cut them while frozen. Only problem I had
was chasing those slippery frozen balls around on my cutting board! Boy can
they slide.
--
Jayel
"---Pete---" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 27 Aug 2003 17:11:17 -0500, Mark Anderson
wrote:

Does anyone have good tips on freezing these? My parent's put them in
boiling water for a couple of minutes and then peel the skins, smash them
up, and put them in ziplock bags to freeze.
------
I freeze lots of cherry tomatoes. Just rinse them and freeze them.
I use them in sandwiches throughout the year by partially thawing
and then flattening them using the blade of my chef's knife.

I also get many pounds of tomatoes as you described and
process them in about 5 to 10 pound batches where I'll liquify
them using the blender as you described. Then what I'll do is
strain them to remove the seeds and large bits of skin. I store
the liquified tomatoes in the refrig until I get about 15 cups of
liquified tomatoes that I'll cook to make spaghetti sauce
and pizza sauce. I do the same thing by cooking some Chili
and freezing it. Each batch of spaghetti sauce I cook typicaly
includes about 6 pounds of beefcubes/meatballs/sausage
that I also freeze.

I freeze the cooked sauces and store them in those plastic
containers that measure about 10" by 6" by 2". When I need
sauce throughout the year, I place the frozen block on my cutting
board and use an ice pick to put a few dimples in a straight line
across the block then I drive the pick all the way through in the
center and the piece I need breaks off cleanly. Actually quite
easy to do this. You can always get just the right amount you
need for any meal, large or small.

One other thing I do with all this cooked sauce is I'll make a
huge batch of Lasagna and cut it into meal sized pieces and
freeze it in plastic containers.

Sure, all the above is lots of work but it really pays off throughout
the year when you can put together great meals in very short
time using the frozen goods. Using my frozen goods, I can put
together a meal of chii in about 3 minutes. I can put together a
meal of pasta & meat using my frozen spaghetti sauce &
frozen meats in about 15 minutes.

I also make lots of pizza pies throughout the year with my
frozen pizza sauce but that is a whole story in itself. grin

---pete---