There are certain instances where we would often get too many tomatoes in our pantry, especially if we are near tomato farms or gardens. It is during the summer season where we get plenty of tomatoes, and it is often important for us to store at least ten or more tomatoes during the fall and winter seasons to make dishes.
However, some people don’t know what to do with their tomatoes after summer, so they would just throw the tomatoes away before they spoil or become rotten. Fortunately, for those who want to fully utilize all of the stocks of tomatoes, there are several different ways for them to use their leftover tomatoes during the summer. We are here to provide those people with some dishes that they can cook or prepare using tomatoes as one of the primary ingredients. So, let’s get started and enumerate each dish.
Salad
The most common dish to make with leftover tomatoes is a salad, which you can prepare by just having tomatoes, lettuce, and a salad dressing. You also have the option to add other ingredients if you like, but if you only want to use leftover ingredients, you can pair your summer tomatoes with the leftover lettuce you have in your fridge.
Soup
Tomato soup is arguably one of the best comfort foods that people can easily prepare. By turning your tomatoes into soup, you wouldn’t even know or taste that they are leftovers. Of course, like salads, you can also add other ingredients to your tomato soup to make it even tastier and more nutritious.
Bruschetta
Bruschetta is a simple Italian dish that consists of garlic bread that is smothered with a mixture of olive oil and salt at the top, and then served with different toppings, with tomatoes being the most popular. Besides tomatoes, you can also top the bruschetta with cured meat, cheese, and even other vegetables for more flavor.
Tomato Omelet
Another easy dish that you can cook with leftover tomatoes is the tomato omelet, as you would only need an egg and sliced tomatoes to make the dish. However, most people would often add basil, olive oil, and cheese to the dish while it is cooking or after it is prepared to make it have more flavor than what the tangy tomatoes can offer.
Traybake
When we think of traybake, most of us would probably imagine the brownies-looking mini cakes that are baked on a tray. However, there is also another dish called “leftover traybake,” which is usually made from leftover ingredients from thanksgiving, Christmas, or from the summer season. This leftover traybake can consist of different vegetables like potatoes, onions, and tomatoes, but it may also have sausages, pieces of chicken, or ham.
Tomato and Garlic Pasta
Of course, another obvious dish where you can use leftover tomatoes is pasta, specifically the tomato and garlic pasta, if you want the preparation to be a little bit easier. For the simplest tomato and garlic pasta, you would only need angel hair pasta, sliced tomatoes, garlic, tomato paste, parmesan cheese, and olive oil as the ingredients.
Pickled Tomatoes
The best way for you to make the leftover tomatoes last longer is to pickle them, and turning them into pickled tomatoes is actually quite easy. First, you would need to make the pickling brine, which is done by stirring vinegar, salt, water, and sugar in a saucepan over high heat. Once the brine is made, you would then place your washed and dried leftover tomatoes inside a jar along with garlic and peppercorns. Then, you would pour the brine inside the jar and tighten the lid of the jar while removing air bubbles.
Salsa
If you are craving for some salsa and nachos, you can use your leftover tomatoes to make homemade salsa rather than buying a jar of it in grocery stores. To make salsa, all you would need are diced medium tomato, jalapeno peppers, cloves of garlic, onions, and green chili peppers if you want more spice to your dip. Besides being used as a dip for nachos, you can also have salsa as a condiment for tacos or any other Mexican or Mexican-American foods.
So, there you have, just eight in dozens of different dishes that you can prepare using your leftover tomatoes. Using leftover ingredients allows you to maximize all the food that you have in your pantry and fridge while also enabling you to save more money since you don’t have to ingredients every now and then.
Being smart in preparing and cooking foods is important in improving several aspects of your daily life. These aspects include maximizing resources, saving money, and being more practical. We hope that the food ideas we gave you in this article helped you make the most out of all your leftover ingredients and not just tomatoes, as some of the dishes mentioned above can also be cooked using other ingredients.