Tomato Relish

September 6, 2009 kiwisizzler Leave a comment Go to comments

DSCF6837I love tomatoes. They are one of the things I look forward to most in summer and I always grow half a dozen varieties each year. This year I grew around 25-30 plants with varieties such as Money Makers, Golden Sunrise, Tigerella, Strawberry tomatoes and Cherry tomatoes all doing very well. Last week I was picking 500g+ each night after work…very satisfying.

One of my foodie childhood memories is making tomato relish with Mum so I’ve decided to have a bash and share my recipe.

Enjoy!

1.5kg tomatoes – quartered and ‘eyes’ removed

3 large onions – chopped

1.5 cups malt vinegar

1.5 cups demerara sugar

1.5 Tbsp mustard powder

1 Tbsp hot curry powder

½ tsp chilli powder

2 tsp salt

1½ Tbsp cornflour

  1. In a large, heavy-based saucepan simmer the tomatoes and onions over a low-medium heat until they have released their liquid and reduced by around half. Stir frequently. This will likely take around 1-1½ hours.
  2. Add the remaining ingredients and lower the temperature to a very gentle simmer.
  3. Continue cooking for around 2 hours until the relish has reduced by around 1/3 and thickened slightly.
  4. Mix the cornflour with a little water and add to the relish.
  5. Simmer a further 5 minutes.
  6. Store in sterilized glass jars until needed. For best results leave the relish to develop and integrate its flavours for a few weeks before consumption.DSCF8672
Categories: Food, Food Photos, Fruit & Vegetables, Recipes, Tomato Relish Tags: ,
  1. foggle
    February 9, 2010 at 1:57 am | #1
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    I’ve just made a similar tomato relish recipe but the cooking time is a lot shorter. I wonder if that is because the toms/onions are salted overnight to remove moisture. Do you think the long, slow cook you use would intensify the flavours more?

    The receip I use is here.

    • kiwisizzler
      February 27, 2010 at 2:48 pm | #2
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      Hi Erin,
      I’ve found that longer cooking sweetens the flavour more and removes any bitterness, especially when cooking with onions. Onions have a lot of sugar that is only released under prolonged cooking and other vegetables such as broccoli also need a certain degree of cooking to remove a similar bitterness. The longer you cook sauces the more you remove water content, thus increasing natural flavour. I would imagine that salting the tomatoes and onions would also remove water content, resulting in a shorter cooking time.
      Happy cooking,
      Caleb

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