We’re not eating these today, but I’m trying to keep ahead of the ripening tomatoes. My husband doesn’t care for tomatoes, but will eat a few roasted ones with pasta. He won’t go near a green pepper, but it’s my favorite of the peppers, so this dish is all mine. I had about 8 or so plum tomatoes and a bunch of cherry tomatoes, so I roasted them together. Now I just need to decide on a recipe or two for them. Flat bread? Sandwich? Pasta?
Roasted Tomatoes and Peppers
Preheat oven to 400-425° F
I’ve roasted tomatoes—and other vegetables—at a variety of temperatures, depending on whether I just want the item cooked through or caramelized. Sometimes 350° is enough and I have even heard of slow roasting at 200° for about 4 hours. 400-425° is good for shocking the vegetables—I’m sure that’s not the right word for getting the roasting going, but it seems right.
This is more of a method recipe than one with specific amounts. You’ll figure out what works for you.
- Choose the right pan: You want to be able to put all your vegetables in one layer. I lined a sheet pan with foil, but you could use a stoneware or glass baking dish without foil. Just make sure the pan has sides. I would not roast tomatoes on a rack, because they wouldn’t cook in their own juices.
- I halve and seed most tomatoes for roasting, but you can roast cherry tomatoes whole, unless you want a drier more caramelized result. The whole tomatoes burst and create a lot of liquid that cooks down. Today, I wanted that. But I did halve and seed the plum tomatoes. I thought it would be nice to have a dish with a variety of tomato types and textures together. I cut an x in the stem end of the cherry tomatoes to prevent them bursting too much or exploding!
- As you can see, I added strips of 2 green peppers.
- Drizzle with olive oil in the pan, or mix all in a bowl and then spread in the pan.
- Seasoning: Because I didn’t know how I might end up using the roasted vegetables, I only added sliced garlic (3 cloves) and black pepper. You could add herbs like thyme or basil or oregano.
- Roast for about an hour, but check after 30 minutes to see how it looks. Because I had halved tomatoes and little whole ones, I didn’t want one to cook faster than the other. That’s why I put all the cherry tomatoes on one end of the pan, in case I needed to remove them sooner. I ended up leaving them all in for the full hour, though.
The plum tomatoes turned out more charred and caramelized than the cherry tomatoes, which stayed a little more plump and moist. I think that will make a nice contrast in whatever dish I decide to use them. Right now, I’m just thinking of a nice crusty bread or flat bread with a dusting of Parmesan.
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