How To: Oven-dry Cherry Tomatoes
Make your own version of delicious sun-dried cherry tomatoes while cutting down on food and packaging waste
Look at these OVEN-DRIED CHERRY TOMATOES… Aren’t they so cute? These little gems will look great in an antipasto platter or salad, or simply tossed through cooked pasta, where they are particularly good with Parmesan and herbs, or peas and crumbled feta. I also like to pop them in baking – they make scrumptious mini pizza muffins or savoury scrolls.
Why is this a great Zero-Waste recipe?
The recipe doesn’t stipulate the exact amount of cherry tomatoes, but instead, let’s you know what you’ll need for each cup of cherry toms you have at hand, being from a surplus of cherry tomatoes in the garden, half-empty punnets that may have been forgotten in the fridge or purchased for this purpose. Plus, after you make them once, and see how easy, versatile and yummy they are, you’ll never wonder again about what to do with surplus cherry toms.
How easy is it to make my own Oven-dried Cherry Tomatoes?
The recipe is very simple to make, and all it requires is time in a lowish oven, and some checking from your part, specially towards the end, to make sure they’re not burning, instead of drying. If you notice the edges going dark, that means you need to drop the temperature oven by at least 10°C.
Perfect as a DIY gift!
Finally, these OVEN-DRIED CHERRY TOMATOES also make a charming gift when stored in a jar, submerged in olive oil, and one that any foodie would love to receive. Kept in the fridge, they’ll be fine for several weeks (if they last that long! ).
Oven-dried Cherry Tomatoes
Recipe by Clean Plate
Ingredients:
Cherry tomatoes, halved
For each cup of cherry tomatoes use:
½ tsp finely-ground sea salt
¼ tsp raw sugar
½ tsp dried oregano
½ tsp dried marjoram (if unavailable, replace with oregano or thyme)
Method:
1. Preheat the oven to 100°C.
2. Lightly oil the base of an oven proof tray with olive oil or cooking spray. Place cherry tomatoes on the tray, cut side up and spaced slightly apart. Sprinkle sea salt, sugar and herbs evenly among cherry tomatoes. Thin drizzle cherry tomatoes with olive oil (I usually place nozzle of olive oil close to tomatoes and carefully drizzle one “strip” of oil on each row of tomatoes). Place tray in the oven.
2. Check cherry tomatoes from time to time until tomatoes have shriveled to half their size and most of their moisture has dried. Cooking time will vary, depending on size of cherry toms, but as rule of thumb, they will take at least 2 hours – after that, check at 30 mins intervals, until they are done. In case tomatoes are browning too fast around the edges, turn down oven temperature slightly.
3. Eat straight away or if storing, let cherry tomatoes cool down on tray before storing them in a clean jar or airtight container, submerged in olive oil. They’ll keep in the fridge for several weeks. The oil in the jar may set, but it’ll easily come back to liquid form once in room temperature.
If you liked this recipe or would like to know more about it, please let us know in the comments! :)