Recipe: Roasted tomato sauce: cheaper than chips

If you have a glut of home grown tomatoes, this recipe really is cheaper than chips.  If you don't, it isn't!

There are loads of ways of making a tomato sauce.  My blogging friend, Diane, cooks hers in a pan after frying some garlic in olive oil first.  I will do her way next time, I think.  This is what I did yesterday.

Ingredients: (amounts are vague - I didn't weigh or count the tomatoes, for example)
tomatoes (halved if they are not too small)
A small onion, peeled and roughly chopped
A red pepper, deseeded and cut into chunks
2 cloves of garlic, peeled
a very good glug of olive oil
some good vegetable stock, such as marigold
herbs to own taste - I used some mixed herbs

I didn't add salt or pepper as the sauce was destined for the freezer.  I will add those when I use the sauce.  Diane also suggests adding a very little sugar to dispel any bitterness.

Method:
In a roasting dish add the tomatoes, onion, red pepper and garlic.  Pour over a good glug of olive oil and mix it all well.

Pop the lot into a moderate oven (about 140-160) and roast slowly, stirring occasionally, until the mix is starting to char at the edges and everything is soft.
Add some boiling water and some stock powder, stir well and pop back in the oven for about 15 mins.

Pour and 'push' the lot through a mouli using the finest setting.  This will catch all the pips, skin, etc.  I encouraged the last flavour through with a little more boiling water as the sauce was thick enough to cope with it.  Next time, I will try zizzing in Thermione first before pushing it through a sieve, just to see if there's any difference.  There might be a little bitterness but perhaps a little sugar will take care of that.  Worth a try, anyway.

That's it!  I put single portions into little pots, lids on, bagged up and in the freezer they went.  Well, yes, I did taste first.  Very nice too.