I didn’t mention in my last post that we (Gosia) cooked up the first batch of tomato ketchup. Her mum stumbled across the recipe about three years ago and sales of tomato sauce have taken a serious hit in the village ever since, some shops see no reason to stock it all!
No pictures, just a copy of the scribbled notes from Gosias recipe book, an increasingly thick binding, with a few notes on preparation.
You will need:
2Kg (4.4lb) of Courgettes. You know the big ones that appeared in your garden overnight that could be marrows!
1/2Kg (just over a 1lb) Onions
400g (1lb) Tomato puree
200 ml (7fl Oz) Strong vinegar (10%)
400g (1lb) Sugar
Handful Dried Basil
Handful Herbes de Provence (mixed herbs)
2tsp Sweet paprika
1tsp Chilli powder
Handful of salt
We scaled up the recipe to 6Kg and it made a total of 42, 200ml jars, the meaning of life perhaps!
What you need to do:
Peel, deseed and then grate the firm flesh of the courgettes and onions, or finely chop. (we do this ‘washing up’ bowl scale)
Add salt, mix in and leave for 4-6 six hours
Come back to the bowl when you remember about it and squeeze the mixture to remove the water.
Put in a big pan, cook till soft and mushy
Add the rest of the ingredients
Cook for a further 10-20 minutes to thicken it up a bit, them blend for a smoother sauce if desired
Add to jars and then pasteurise in a big pan of water for about 10 minutes
Enjoy
We will make another two batches before the courgettes disappear, dropping the sugar and vinegar content slightly as a matter of taste. One batch will also have added fresh chilli’s to keep BBQs entertaining.
You could of course make your own tomato puree, if you had a bumper crop, you could also use your own herbs, it’s also possible to make your own vinegar, which would just leave the sugar and salt as the shop bought ingredients making this a seriously low cost ketchup. But for now we bought it all in bar the courgettes and onions, and the cost still only came in at around 15p for a 200ml jar.
