Grating tomatoes - who knew?

[MARISKANY]

I saw a Spanish chef on TV the other day using a technique that was totally new to me. Instead of boiling tomatoes to remove the skin and then seeding and dicing, he cut the raw tomato in half horizontally and squeezed out the seeds and juices, and grated the tomato half using the large holes in a hand held grater. He stopped at the skin. I bought a 5 lb. bucket of tomatoes on Wednesday at the Farmer's Market and used this technique for half of them. I made some tomato jam with some of the puree and with the other half I made a very simple shrimp sauce for pasta last night.

What a time saver.

[Terrie H.]

You were watching Jose Andres and his grating method works well if you need one or two, but my food mill is better for bigger jobs (just more to was).

[chefathome]

I do this with tomatoes and onions and save the resulting tomato and onion juice for marinating, stocks, etc.

[smartie]

brilliant idea. I should have thought of that because I grate hard boiled eggs for egg salad with the flat of my hand. It's so quick.

I will try this for sauces thanks.

[oldunc]

It's actually pretty slow for large amounts of tomatoes, and tends to be a bit wasteful unless the tomatoes are very ripe- a food mill is a better choice. Heating over an open flame and dipping in water is probably the fastest way for 3-4 tomatoes.

[MARISKANY]

A lot of us don't have access to an open flame. I found it went very fast especially since I didn't have to wait for water to boil.

[monavano]

Do not get how it's wasteful or time consuming. Personally, I cook my tomatoes and blast them in my Vitamix, skins and all. But his method seems solid.

[oldunc]

I't works pretty well, but if you have a couple pounds of tomatoes you get sick of it. For a couple of tomatoes, it is pretty convenient, since it takes almost no prep. Tomatoes that aren't really ripe will resist releasing from the skin, and you will probably end up throwing out some flesh with the skins. In extreme cases, like supermarket saladettes in November, none of the regular methods work very well- a vegetable peeler might be your best bet. Actually, canned tomatoes are usually a better one. If you don't have a flame, flame charring is out- you could use a torch if you wish to entertain the children. Some people use the broiler- I haven't tried it, but would guess its messy and not particularly fast.