Every Way to Cook a Tomato (47 Methods) | Bon Appétit

hi everyone I'm Emil static editor-at-large at Bon Appetit and this is almost every way to cook a tomato who doesn't love a good tomato there are so many delicious and different types to choose from we've got sweet little Sun golds meaty Roma's all different shapes and sizes and colors of heirloom tomatoes but today we're gonna be taking a closer look at the good old-fashioned beefsteak tomato it's got a great balance and flesh to juice it's a super tomato a tomato it's really versatile and hey stop it's really verse 8 stop seriously with it oh stop how do you like that okay so we've got a lot of tomatoes and we're gonna try to cook them in every way that we can possibly think of let's stop doing that mom raw tomato well you don't need to do anything to a tomato in order to eat it so we're just gonna take it as it is you know a tomato is a fruit after all so I'm just gonna eat it like an apple a little bit sweet a little bit tart you got a lot of textural contrast the skin the flesh the sea is the juice there's a lot going on this was a peak summer tomato I'd be perfectly happy eating at this plain sliced and salted tomato a little salt goes a long way we're gonna slice this with a serrated knife which is often easier we're gonna place our slices on a rack hit both sides of the little salt and let it sit for 15 minutes or so to get some of the water out before we dig in so while it's been sitting you can see that some liquid is kind of collected on the surface and that's just a liquid from the tomato being drawn out it looks almost redder hmmm so simple and delicious this to me is the Platonic ideal of a raw tomato this salt both intensifies and concentrates the flavor so it tastes extra tomato Eve sometimes simple is best and seared tomato okay we're gonna cut out the core real quick cut it in half and Pat it dry so it'll take a serum or easily a little bit of oil in this hot pan but our tomatoes and cut side down and that's my friends is a seared tomato this smells really good we've got some good carmelization of the tomatoes natural sugars hmm nice concentrated complex flavor around those cut sides but the rest is just raw tomato we'd probably get more bang for our buck if we had sliced this tomato instead of having it to create more surface area it's promising though fried tomato we're gonna cut this into five slices lay them out on paper towels and hit them with salt then let them sit for about 15 minutes to draw out some moisture okay now we're gonna dredge them in flour egg and then bread crumbs place them carefully into this hot oil give them a flip when they're browned hit them with a bit of salt and fried tomatoes these are beautiful nice crispy all around and you can still see a smidge of the tomato in there cutting in you can see the inside looks soft and pretty cooked hmm that's great the tomato is a bit watery but the fat and the crunch really complement the flavor and texture of the fruit typically this is done with unripe green tomatoes but this would make a great appetizer drying tomato season lamb soup tomato I'm gonna take this paring knife and just make a little X mark some salt and carefully lower our tomato in let it sit for about a minute then pull it out and transfer it to a bowl of ice water then I'm gonna use this knife to slide the skin off so it was really easy to just slip the skin off this exterior layer is it a little bit mealy but otherwise this tomato is totally raw inside which is the idea mmm yep it's pretty much a raw tomato without the skin it's not adding all that much the tomato eating experience but if you wanted to use tomatoes in a recipe without the skin it's a really easy way to get there tomato sushi now we're gonna put a blanched tomato to good use we're gonna cut our tomato into pieces remove the tough core and then carefully cut out the inner membrane with the seeds and juices get those into a bowl and add some soy sauce sesame oil and let that marinate for about 15 minutes okay the pieces are very delicate now that they've been marinating we got some warm sushi rice that I'm gonna form into a little nugget and then carefully lay a piece of this tuna looking tomato on top and compress it slightly I'm no Giro so I guess this is sushi and so far as it's on top of rice and kind of looks like fish the rice is still warm and the tomato is cool so there's some interesting contrast going on it smells great I mean mrs. tasty the flavor profile is great the soy sauce really backs up the fruits natural umami but sushi it is not made o tartare we've got another blanched and peeled tomato and we're gonna quarter it cut the core out and then remove the seedy parts and membrane which will water things down and then dice it up nice we're gonna toss it with a bit of salt and olive oil but this fancy ring mold on a plate pack this mixture in there to give it some shape pull up the mold and tomato tartare this is more of a visual gimmick than anything else diced tomato made to look like beef or tuna tartare the whole thing kind of falls apart it doesn't adhere the way that a protein based tartare would I mean it tastes good with the salt and the olive oil but this is basically just a bruschetta topping where's the bread raw tomato sauce so this is the simplest possible raw tomato sauce we're gonna grate it into a bowl which is cool because the skin just kind of stays behind in my hand a little bit of oil a pinch of salt stir that together and we're done very rustic oh the texture is loose and pulpy and uneven and well we don't have any skin in there we've still got some seeds hmm that's really yummy just pure clean tomato flavor with an appealingly rough texture I don't think I want this with pasta necessarily but it'll be great with a bit of garlic and parsley as a sauce for fish or something like that tomato passata sauce this is probably the simplest Italianate tomato sauce there is some wouldn't even call it a sauce we're gonna cook these for just a few minute until they're broken down and kind of soup beat and now we're gonna transfer our just clip tomatoes to a food mill which is gonna break down the tomatoes and keep any pieces of skin and seeds out of the finished product and we're done so there's no seats no skin in there just totally smooth and homogeneous it's definitely a little bit loose since it didn't cook down long enough to get any water out definitely sweeter than our raw sauce because the seeds tend to lend a bit of bitterness it's not bad but this would make a better base for another sauce than a sauce on its own clip tomato sauce similar but different we've got our Posada but now we're going to get it back into the saucepan and let it cook down for the next 45 minutes or so to try to concentrate its flavor definitely looks concentrated get this into a bowl and we've got some tasty-looking tomato sauce obviously this doesn't have any of the aromatics that you would typically associate with a proper tomato sauce it's darker and noticeably thicker not nearly as watery hmm wow that tastes so different darker deeper way more concentrated in savory this is definitely what I want is the base for my spaghetti sauce tomato paste let's take it one step further shall we we have our 45 minute cooked tomato sauce and we're gonna put it on this sheet pan and let it cook down the oven for another four hours whoa that looks like tomato paste all right this is noticeably darker and thicker than your store-bought tomato paste would be it's almost gelatinous and it's darkened a lot around the edges mmm oh my gosh this is actually so so delicious you know store-bought tomato paste often has kind of a tinny metallic kind of raw flavor but this tastes incredible huge umami flavor tomato leather we've got our cook down sauce we're gonna spread it out evenly on this parchment then we're gonna get the rack in there and let it go at 135 degrees for about 10 hours whoa this looks wild an ancient scroll made from dinosaur flesh or something it's tough and leathery it definitely feels like a dried out for it roll up Wow no flavor is so concentrated that it actually really does taste fruity sweet acidic I bet you could convince somebody that this was raspberry or something like that definitely cool tomato powder let's take our dehydrator situation one step further we're going to slice our Tomatoes put them on the sea hydrator rack let it go to 140 degrees for about 12 hours okay these are good and dry by now we've got our spice grinder we're gonna break our dried tomato slices into pieces and buzz them up voila tomato powder this has such a gorgeous dark ruddy rusty sort of color and just kind of sticks to your hands like Dorito dust mmm well wild it's really sweet really fruity ton of acid up front this would be great as part of a dry rub or a popcorn seasoning or something like that you know it's a beautiful day let's take this party outside smoked tomato we got a tomato we got a smoker we're gonna open this up get our tomato in there close it all right let's get our smoky boy out of there looks good this is kind of freaky looking the skin is starting to peel off and the whole thing does feel pretty soft I mean it was in there at a low temperature for a really long period of time inside totally cooked still pretty juicy mmm fair amount of smoked flavor on that outside which is really nice with the tomatoes natural savoriness porch tomato we got our Tomatoes we got our searzall which is just a modified blowtorch we're gonna do our thing all right okay oh yeah that looks done I guess we got a lot of color on those cut sides but yeah it's pretty much totally raw inside yeah not particularly special the Browning doesn't have the same appealing smoky quality that our charred Tomatoes did I'm gonna pass on this one laser tomato this right here is the most powerful laser that we were able to find on the Internet all right let's let er rip whoa something's happening all right let's try a different spot see what we can do here all right you know I'm tired of holding this thing let's call it hello world so yeah we got a smiley little laser tomato here got one eye here and then it's other eyes slightly smaller here and then this sick grin here you know I'm gonna call him Thomas Thomas is not really cooked good look at that face YUM it's a raw tomato not sure what else is Simon there's still really juicy sorry little guy I'm not sure all this fresh air is good for me look let's go back to the kitchen juice tomato we got our Tomatoes we got our juicer we're gonna turn this bad boy on and let er rip all right then this is cool you've got this kind of foamy part and the bottom seems to be a lot thinner and more watery so it's pretty tasty you know it's much smoother and lighter and body than a pureed tomato tomato water now we're gonna make a kind of fancied up tomato juice we're gonna quarter our tomatoes get them into this blender with a pinch of salt buzz them up and then pour the puree into a fine mesh strainer lined with cheesecloth we're gonna pop this in the fridge and let it sit overnight all right now that our solids have separated from our liquid we're gonna pour this out and that's our tomato water it's got a beautiful pinky orange color it's almost completely transparent there are a few flecks of tomato solids in there they got past the cheesecloth mmm YUM the tomato flavor here is mild really sweet the texture is really fascinating tomato soda if we can make tomato water why not tomato soda we've got our tomato water we're gonna plug it into this carbonator and push this button a few times make it visit [Music] tomato soda the operating instructions say not to put anything other than water in the machines so maybe that had something to do with it overflowing it's nice and clear looking but not super fizzy it's light it's fruity it's more mineral water fizzy than Seltzer fizzy it's interesting but a pretty disorienting thing to drink you know now that we're good and hydrated let's get a little sunshine campfire Tomatoes ah the great outdoors we're gonna take these three tomatoes and put them right in here on the coals to char and then we're gonna nestle this foil wrapped one right in here and we're just gonna take these off as they're ready coil wrapped in tomato steamy didn't get much color but it's definitely really soft nothing too exciting I mean it's cooked through but there wasn't anywhere for the liquid to go so just kind of steamed in there not sure why I would cook a tomato this way but it does work I guess charred tomato so the skin is burnt and just kind of peeling away and it's definitely fully fully cooked that's actually really delicious I was worried that the skin would taste too bitter but there's a lot of nice smoked flavor a lot of complexity you know I want to take this one step further let's go back to the fire campfire tomato sauce okay we're gonna put a pot right on the fire here and squeeze a couple of our charred Tomatoes in there we're gonna add a little oil and salt and let that cook down a bit to create a sauce should be good let's give this a try we've got some little bits of that charred skin that didn't break down maybe not ideal it's nice and chunky though really thick the flavor is really delicious we've cooked off some of that water and it's really concentrated with tons of umami there are some pasta in there and you'd have a pretty incredible alfresco dinner tomato on a stick well if we're gonna cook over this fire any more we're gonna need some more wood so I may as well just use this easel because I'm never gonna be a real artist I'm never gonna do anything make a name for myself it's like my mother always said you like painting anyways people just love the youtubes you know they're just gonna go on line and watch these videos and no one's ever gonna want to see my paintings or anything that I've ever done this roaring fire brought to you by my deflated sense of self so we've got a tomato on a stick and we're gonna spit roasted over this fire of broken dreams and we're gonna see if it amounts to anything pretty sure there are some chemicals in that wood that are probably poisonous that's on fire and there she goes we all saw that coming didn't we no surprises here see if I can salvage even a shred of my dignity sense of self-worth oh okay this like many things in life is a real disappointment it's ugly and messy and dark I guess I'm gonna have to eat it mmm tastes like ashes both literally and figuratively bitterness despair you know I think it's time we went back inside tomato ice Popp all right let's light things up a little bit shall we so we're gonna put our tomatoes into this blender with a bit of sugar which will keep the pops from getting too icy and buzz it all up now I'm gonna put these into the freezer for the night and now that they're fully frozen we're gonna get this into some warm water so it releases and there's our tomato ice Popp it's interesting it looks like the tomato water and the solids kind of separated a bit it certainly smells like tomato you know it's not as sweet as you would expect and it's a bit icy I should have added more sugar it's intriguing but it would be better if it was like Bloody Mary flavored or something like that on its own it's a little bit of a letdown tomato granita alright let's blend our prep Tomatoes along with a bit of sugar and salt then strain it and pour it into this loaf pan we're gonna put this into the freezer for about an hour now that it's mostly frozen we're gonna use a fork to rough it up a bit and then get it back into the freezer for another couple of hours okay now it's totally frozen we're gonna rough it up even more and get that granita into a bowl beautiful this looks really pretty the texture is kind of like a shaved ice hmm the mouth feels really cool it's icy and refreshing and it kind of just dissolves on your tongue it really plays up the sweetness of that tomato I don't know how much of this I'd want to eat but it would make a great palate cleanser in the middle of a long summer meal tomato ice cream we've got an ice cream maker we've got a creme anglaise which is just a simple French custard made with cream sugar a little salt and some egg yolks we're gonna pour that into the Machine and we're gonna come back when it's almost frozen okay now that the ice cream is almost there we're gonna pour some tomato passata in and let it finish freezing then we're gonna get this into a loaf pan and freeze it until it's totally solid all right let's make ourselves a little sundae shall we cherry tomato on top perfect the texture is a little bit icy and that's just because there's so much water in that tomato passata that we added it's not super super smooth mmm the tomato flavor is pretty muted actually I think it would have worked way better with tomato paste but I do think of the sweet floral qualities are coming through it's interesting but I think I'd rather have the granita at the end of the day baked tomato we've got a have tomato and we're gonna pop this into a 300 degree oven for about an hour and we got a baked tomato so because it was at such a low temperature we didn't get a ton of color but it has shrunk in a bit it's not super super cooked inside it's still a little firm flavors definitely concentrated somewhat but I think it could have gone for a few more hours and for sure want some salt and fat not that much going on here but this method has potential roasted tomato now we have a hab tomato with a bit of salt and oil and we're gonna put it into a 400 degree oven for about 45 minutes and Audi comes this definitely cooked down pretty significantly it's changed color a lot and there's good charring even though it's still pretty juicy that's really really nice the flavor is much denser and that char has plenty of complexity that balances the sweetness and acidity this is a great oven method broiled tomato one more time for good measure have salted oiled and we're gonna pop it under the broiler ooh smoky out all right broiled tomatoes the heat was really intense and direct and the oil produced a lot of smoke you can see that this skin is sloughing off here and but it still feels very firm inside is mostly raw yeah there's a bit of an acrid kind of smoky flavor going on the inside is mealy and pretty raw this would probably be better with a smaller less dense tomato but didn't work right here confit tomato for my last oven trick we've got some Tomatoes we've halved and submerged in olive oil and we're gonna put them into a 300 degree oven for about 45 minutes voila confit tomatoes these are definitely firmer than I thought they'd be after that much time in the oven this would probably work better with a smaller tomato but they're really glossy without olive oil it's really pretty hmm you know it's just super tasty really rich on that texture is almost silky this is a winner for sure you know I think I'm finally ready to go outside again grilled tomatoes we got our Tomatoes we got a hot grill we're gonna put a whole tomato over here and then a tomato that we've halved salted and oiled here and then some chunks of tomato we've threaded onto skewers here we're just gonna pull these off as they're ready whole grilled tomato so the skin has split a little bit and we have some grill marks but it still feels really firm I think it's too thick to cook properly this way yeah I mean it's warm throughout but it's not really cooked through yeah not a lot going on here this is basically just a warmed up tomato grilled have tomato this definitely looks more cooked and we've got some appealing charring here but it also stuck a bit so I think the most flavorful bits may have gotten left behind mmm okay okay a little bit of that caramelized flavor we like sweetness complexity all that but just not that much of it it's not bad but not that distinctive either skewered tomatoes these pieces feel pretty universally soft and they've got some color around the edges but we also lost a few pieces on the grill because the chunks got so soft you know this actually tastes better than the other two we increase the surface area which made them cook more fully and quickly it's a little bit clumsy but not bad at all let's go back to the kitchen just watch oh there are a lot of different ways to make a spot show but my favorite is one that's thin drinkable and emulsified with a lot of olive oil pinch of salt add some sherry vinegar for acid and once it's going we're going to stream in that olive oil and process it until it's smooth and matte looking beautiful the weight of the olive oil emulsified in there change the color a lot it's almost orangey hmm YUM I love this it's got nice body from the oil it's acidic it's very refreshing blender cooked tomato now we're gonna use the heat of this high-powered blenders motor to cook our Tomatoes these been blanched and peeled we're gonna prep them get them into our blender and let that run for about ten whole minutes ooh steamy blender cook Tomatoes this is pretty hot after being in the blender for that long the motor generates so much heat it's definitely aerated it's kind of foamy mm-hmm I mean it tastes like slightly cooked tomato if we had some garlic maybe a little cream or butter we'd have a proper soup not bad but more of a starting point microwave tomato we got our tomato we got our microwave we're just gonna stab this a few times to let some steam out when it cooks and pop it in there for about four minutes hmm okay let's put it in for another round and microwave tomato it bursts a little bit and some of the liquid leached out here hmm I mean it seems pretty unevenly cooked some really soft parts and some still quite firm I mean it's just a hot tomato not sure why I would do this but I'm not offended by it iron tomato we've cut our tomato in half we're just gonna spray our iron with a bit of Pam just sitting in my hotel room needing to cook a tomato with whatever I've got well I guess this is done definitely got some unevenness in terms of the coloration but we did get some browning right around here oh yeah it's still pretty raw I mean I'm liking the flavor the brownie offered but this is just a mostly uncooked tomato sous-vide tomato we have an already blanched tomato we're gonna season it suck all the air out of this bag and this immersion circulator is gonna cook it at a consistent a hundred forty ish degrees for about 45 minutes and she's done fascinating so the tomato seems fully cooked throughout but also really firmed the flesh was kind of compressed and is a lot denser a lot of the liquid has just kind of leached out here mmm this is really cool the flesh is really meaty and the flavor is denser and more concentrated than I would have expected this has a lot of potential I'd love to see how it would taste we added a marinade or spice mix or something like that to it slow cooker tomato we're gonna get this lid off put our tomato right in here and then add about a cup of waters to get it going turn this bad boy on we're gonna let it go for about four hours yep that's cooked alright the whole thing feels really soft and it's definitely darkened somewhat still very juicy hmm I mean it's very tender but it just kind of tastes hooked it would make way more sense to use a slow cooker to cook down a Posada or something like that with a whole tomato it's just kind of silly Timm tomato we've got three tomatoes that we've already blanched we're gonna core these get them into our jar add a bit of salt and lemon juice close it up and get it into this pot of hot water so it'll seal alright it's been 45 minutes these tomatoes are definitely canned alright let's get it open yep yeah we're really just looking at whole Tomatoes floating in their own liquid they've fallen apart somewhat they're mostly intact you know that's actually way more flavorful than I'd expect way better than grocery store canned tomatoes none of that tin can flavor I'd love to use this as a base for a pasta dish or a braised yum tomato brulee well you can brulee a grapefruit why not a tomato we're gonna sprinkle our tomato halves with some sugar then use our culinary torch to blast them gets getting crispy looks relate to me we managed a pretty handsome crust here and it really smells like caramel the tomato underneath is almost totally raw it's got a little piece [Music] interesting it's obviously super sweet there's also a strong savory note from where the tomato juices caramelize along with the sugar it's not bad exactly but definitely an unexpected flavor situation not sure if I like it or not made out to tan this dish is traditionally made with apples but why not tomatoes smear butter in this cast-iron pan pour a layer of sugar over and arrange our prep tomatoes we're going to turn the heat on and let the sugar and tomato juices cook down to a caramel now we layer some defrosted puff pastry over top tuck it in make a few slits and pop that into a 450 degree oven for about 24 minutes gorgeous all right all we have to do is put this plate on top try to wipe it out in one fluid motion hey not too shabby this kind of smells like a dessert pizza hmm this is really special and different it definitely plays up the sweeter side of the tomatoes and this buttery pastry really rounds things out super cool tickled tomato okay let's put our prep tomato slices into this jar we're gonna add some salt and sugar to this hot vinegar and water mixture and stir it to dissolve I'm gonna pour that over close it up then we're gonna fridge this until it's cold and pickly let's pop that lid off mmm smells nice and vinegary hmm YUM the sugar in the vinegar really back up the natural sweetness and acidity of the fruit so it tastes really tomato Eve I couldn't eat a whole plate of these but they'd be great with cheese or to chase a shot of cold vodka fermented tomato now that we've pickled the tomato we're gonna try to ferment one we're gonna core it dice it mix it with some salt and then put it in a bag and seal it we're gonna let this sit for a few days at room temperature while the friendly microbes and bacteria and their do their thing Wow okay so we can tell that these are fermented because the bag is puffed up which tells us the little guys in there have been converting sugar to acid and co2 we're gonna cut it open oh that smells wild that smell is crazy it's really yeasty and funky which I find very appealing but others might find gross the tomato pieces have broken down somewhat almost as if they've been cooked that's good as a taste yeah Wow out wild it's funky almost fizzy with a kind of sour malty beer like flavor big umami energy it almost tastes fruitier than it did before this has a ton of potential I'd love to see what this would be like in a tomato sauce tomato caviar science time all right we got some tomato juice here and we're gonna whisk in some sodium alginate which is gonna thicken it they let this chill for a few hours now it's really thick and jiggly almost like ketchup we've got some warm water here and we're gonna mix this calcium chloride in until it dissolves then we take the syringe slurp up some tomato business and start adding a drop at a time to the water bath kind of looking more like tadpoles than beads of caviar but I guess that's something so here we have our tomato quote caviar unquote I mean it only barely looks like caviar but the beads are definitely firm and it formed a bit of a skin [Music] yeah I mean it honestly just tastes like tomato juice but has a kind of spongy texture this is more of a gimmicky molecular gastronomy thing than anything else I'll pass on this one thanks tomato aspic a little 1950's dinner party throwback for you we're gonna bring some tomato juice up to a simmer to reduce it slightly meanwhile we've got some cold water here and we're gonna whisk this gelatin in until it's fully dissolved then we're gonna spray this bundt pan with Pam so our aspect doesn't stick then stir our gelatin mixture into the hot tomato juice and pour that into our bundt pan this is gonna need to sit in the fridge for a while to set okay so you can see that our aspic firmed up nicely now comes the tricky part we're gonna set it into this bowl of warm water so that hopefully releases from the pan put a plate over top and boom tomato aspic who's hungry JBL this looks nuts it's so bouncy and freaky-looking can you believe that people used to actually serve this you know it actually tastes pretty good the texture is weird as all help but if I really leaned into it I would love this with a plop of cottage cheese right there in the middle this is definitely a way to cook a tomato all right today we prepared Tomatoes just about every way we could think of what do we learn well for one tomatoes have a wide range of complex flavors and different methods play to their different strengths we also learned that tomatoes contain a lot of water and some of our favorite ways of cooking them were all about concentrating them as much as possible have a method that you didn't see here today leave it in the comments

Channel: Bon Appétit

Views: 3,788,499

Rating: 4.7959433 out of 5

Keywords: tomato, tomatoes, amiel stanek, amiel, every way tomato, every way to cook tomato, every tomato, every way tomatoes, how to cook tomatoes, amiel bon appetit, amiel makes, every way, almost every, almost every tomato, amiel makes tomato, amiel cooks tomato, amiel tomato, amiel tomatoes, every way to make tomato, every way to cook tomatoes, cook tomato, cooking tomatoes, how to tomato, cooking tomato, cook tamatoes, tomato sauce, make tomato sauce, food, bon appetit

Id: A2VAN7PtQW0

Length: 30min 14sec (1814 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 30 2019