Tomato harvest and homemade spagetti sauce

The tomatoes in the garden have produced a fair number of tomatoes this summer. I have been harvesting them and they have been ripening like crazy.

Today's project is homemade tomato sauce. I will freeze it and store it for winter pasta dishes.

First off, I scalded the tomatoes so I could peel and seed them.





Then I added the tomatoes to onions (also from my garden) and garlic that had been sautéed. I also added some sweet peppers to the mix.




I let the tomatoes cook down until they broke down completely. Then I added tomato paste and spices (oregano and basil). I cooked it a while longer until it thickened.

After it cooled a bit, I puréed it in my blender. This is so the kiddos can't tell that I added onions and peppers to the mix.

Here it is all puréed and cooling. I can't wait to use it over pasta this winter!



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Chili.....with a healthy twist

In the winter, one of my go-to meals is chili.  It is hearty and warm and I can make it relatively quickly, stick it in the slow cooker for the afternoon and supper is ready.

I decided to try to give my chili a little variety so I used ground turkey in it instead of ground beef.  I do usually use extra lean ground beef and drain off the fat but sometimes I do find it a tad greasy.  I did not find this a problem with the ground turkey.  The chili was excellent!  The kids even had seconds....which to me is a success!

I honestly don't have a recipe per se for chili so I can't share that with you.  It usually involves ground beef (or in this case turkey) tomatoes, beans, kidney beans, onions, celery....sometimes mushrooms and spices.  Here is a picture of our turkey chili.  I will definately be making this again for my family!

Pair it with a good slice of bread and serve.