Catching up with Ketchup, Step #1

So here is a little weirdness, I collect old tomatoes. I keep them cryogenically frozen, like little heads. I supposed I might name one Walt once in a while. Okay, I jest, but I do have pounds & pounds of frozen tomatoes. My wife calls them canonballs, mainly because when she opens up the freezer one shoots out at her once and a while and they skitter on the tile floor. Very exciting! The cats hate it.

So WHY!? Well, I love tomatoes and tend to buy 3# weekly at Haymarket. The tomato guy likes me because I always ask for a range of ripeness, so I can use them up before they spoil. But even with this little bit of preparation, I often have a tomato here & there that is to ripe. So I simply freeze them. To make tomatoes soup (no milk, hate milked T-soup, makes me retch) or make sauces. And what is America’s favorite sauce? One guess genius... "Ketchup", or as the English like to say Catsup. Repeat after me give me a K, give me a E, you can finish from there. It’s so good and so well like our government in it’s wisdom has deemed it a vegetable. Several people including me have deemed french-fries as just a delivery system for ketchup. Don’t be ashamed it’s true.

So why make your own ketchup? #1 for me, I like to make everything once & awhile so I know the difference between crap & caviar. #2 why not?! #3 Yeah everyone is so concerned about sourcing local, local this and that, but folks no one is making local ketchup, no one. Just like I am one of 2 people I know making there own mayonnaise & mustard, hey it comes up in conversations. So I want another feather in my cooking cap.

Where to start, where to start okay Google, found some nice Amish recipe during work a few weeks ago. And the Joy of Cooking, of course my favorite general cookbook. Plus I have some books cooking garden veggies & sauces so I am figuring out where to go from there. Oh, I am making smoked spare ribs tomorrow and want to make BBQ sauce for them. Two types one kinda classic hickory smoked & my Mongolian BBQ sauce.

So I will get back to you on how many pounds of cannonballs ah frozen tomatoes I have lurking in the freeze o be reanimated into a Disney Studio HEAD, and figure out a game plan... I’m going to make a plain ketchup, sort of like HUNT’s, maybe with the zest of Heinz, but I want a canvas to make other sauces on. Oh and the best thing is mine won’t have any evil HFCS bleh! (High Fructose Corn Syrup)