Smokin' Tomatoes

[Ryan S]

So I'm trying the smoke-dried tomatoes recipe. First off, my cast-iron pan was rusted from when I did pizza, so I had to scrub that out a bit.

I only bought 20 tomatoes in case I goof it somehow, which, in my case, may happen. I did start with a few pieces of smoke wood instead of one at a time. We'll see if that's too bad.

The sun has come out, though, and the temps are getting warmer. With just the electric burner, it was about 145. Now it's hit 155 and may get warmer as the day goes on. I'll have to lower the setting on the burner here in a few minutes.

(update)
So, I neglected to leave the top vent open. The smoke wood did not smoke much. I finally opened it and looked and the chunks were blackened, but not burned up.

I opened the vent and now we're smoking again, but six hours in, not sure how well that's going to do for the flavor. We'll see.
20 tomatoes

Rack 'em up

 

[Josh Z.]

Ryan,

Keep us posted on your results... I've been looking into doing this with some of my extra tomatoes once they ripen.

Josh

 

[David Lohrentz]

I have been drying home grown tomatoes for years with a food dryer, but this year I am also going to try smoking them. My thought is to start them off in the smoker and then move to the food dryer.

Does anyone know how much smoke the tomatoes should take to have a nice flavor?

 

[Ryan S]

Ok, the first few are off (8-9 hours, about half are off). Some pics of them, taste testing will begin starting tomorrow.

First few

I was trying to sample some..

Dunked in EVOO

 

[Chris Allingham]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by David Lohrentz:
Does anyone know how much smoke the tomatoes should take to have a nice flavor? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>David, there's an article on this subject on the Web site:

Smoke Dried Tomatoes

Regards,
Chris

 

[Paul K]

Ryan,

How did they taste? If they're good, let me know; I'm just up the road in Round Rock

Paul

 

[David Lohrentz]

Chris--I saw that article, but I couldn't tell if you applied smoke continuously from start to finish or for just a portion of the drying process.

 

[Ryan S]

The first few were tossed in a pasta salad my g/f made, she said they were "tasty".

When she gets home I'll find out more, but haven't been cooking at home the last few days. The smell good, though.

ETA....

Some more were had...the smoke flavor is very powerful on some of them. So maybe a bit less wood, in my case, at the beginning and after six hours. However, quite good. I would err on the side of less smoke in the future, maybe one or two chunks of woods worth.