I arrived at the house of friends Marco and Giovanna this morning to find them making 'strattu [tomato extract] on an almost industrial scale, which is not at all unusual in these parts at this time of year: the tomatoes are first boiled, then passed through the enormous machine Marco and Giovanna have for extracting the pulp and then the skins go back through for a second pressing. This is the stage Giovanna had reached when I arrived. The purée is then salted and I was interested to notice that a little salicylic acid was added as a preservative. [I had not read of this being added before.] Then the 'strattu is spread out on shallow trays to dry in the sun for several days and it has to be stirred often. Only when it is leathery will it be deemed fit to bottle and this lot, made from the contents of about 4 enormous crates of tomatoes such as the ones I photographed on Thursday, will make only about 2 kg of the paste. In the last picture you can see that the liquid content of the pulp has already started to reduce, after a few hours in the sun.
13 comments:
wow that is so cool. I must show this to Q. Thank you for sharing.
You have no idea how funny it is to see your blazing heat and sun-dried tomatoes from the UK which is drowning in torrential rain
I hope there are no flies or birds around! If I tried that here I'd have every bird on the mountain flying around inspecting it (and worse)...and I'm sure the flies and other flying insects would have a ball. Do they use some kind of light meshing to keep out bird droppings, etc.,? I imagine, like when drying out ther fruits etc., it is brought in at night.
You have quite a little factory here.
You sure you're not bootlegging?
See you at the awards, hopefully!
Perhaps I'll sun-dry the 6 tomatoes struggling to survive the British summer. If they ever turn red, that is. If we ever get any more sun, that is...
What a lot of equipment and work involved. Food and cooking really is one of lifes most important things for an Italian family. Just received my new cookbook; lots of new recipes to try out. Reading it has reminded me of the difficulty getting really fresh and good quality ingredients where I live. I would love to go to a daily market to buy what I needed for that evenings meal.
Great photos, Welshcakes. I just read Lee's comments and I hadn't thought about birds and insects.
Interesting that people still do this since most woman work nowadays and no time for this or pasta fatta a mano.
regards
jmb
so glad you like it, Lady M. WW, I look at Uk pics and feel the same - and guilty, for being here. Lee, I will ask them what they do about the flies at night. In the daytime, they just check every couple of hours and pick them out! Crushed, not telling! It was great to se you there! Nice to meet you, Chris - know how you feel. MM, yes, lots of equipment but they would improvise somehow even if they didn't have it. At markets here you have to buy in enormous quantities but it doesn't matter as the small greengocers are so good. jmb, i think it's a bit different down here in the south. Few women would do home-made pasta dough every day now but they still would for a special occasion.
Goodness what a lot of work goes into these things.
James, yes, but Itals know how to make a memorable occasion of it!
It is such a different lifestyle in Sicily, isn't it? More importance seems to be placed on the right things.
Hi, Liz. Yes, they don't turn an occasion like this into a chore. The whole family helps, the washing up is minimal really and the pans are left to dry in the sun. They do have different priorities, some of which I think they have right. But there are others that drive me mad!
Lee, I asked what they do at night: they don't cover it. They just leave it. They might bring it indoors [into a garage] if the Scirocco is blowing and it's very humid but that's unusual at thia time of year.
Post a Comment