This year is Maggie’s first for growing tomatoes, having inherited a green house from her late father and the need to garden to escape some of the draining aspects of work.
The consequence was clear, she had inherited her father’s green fingers without the off switch of experience that limits the number of plants.
However this opened a new opportunity for me as I have never made chutney or jam, other than the odd batch of lemon curd. When I shared a picture Maggie’s bumper crop of tomatoes, lined up in a windowsill to ripen, everyone said ‘Make green tomato chutney’.
After some initial browsing online it was clear that most recipes involve a vast quantity of sugar but with some perseverance I found one that is sugar free (other than that that occurs naturally in the ingredient fruit and veg).
All fairness requires that I share the source of this recipe. I found it on Farmer Dave’s site. However Farmer Dave had borrowed it in turn from Farmgirl Fare and now it has travelled on to me and then to any of you that reads this. ‘Six Degree of Separation’ now feels like it’s more like ‘Three Degrees of Separation’.
Now before I jump into the recipe I must note that it was damn hard work making the chutney. I am glad it would only be an annual endeavour at most. A day over a hot stove, sterilising jars and then filling them was also satisfying. The outcome is 24 jars, each with with about 250g of chutney in them with a SW value of less than 1/2 a syn a jar.
You will need to adjust quantities to match your available ingredients.
Ingredients:
- 1kg of green tomatoes, cored and chopped (mine were cherry tomatoes so no coring and just halved or quartered)
- 500g of chopped onions
- 750g of red peppers, deseeded and chopped
- 500g of cored and chopped bramley apples (no need to peel)
- 6 garlic cloves, finely chopped (I cheated and used ready chopped garlic)
- 250ml of cider vinegar (you can use less of storing all in the fridge but that takes a lot of space)
- 4 large red chilli peppers, deseeded and finely chopped
- 1 hot chilli ( I used a fatali pepper) finely chopped with seeds
- 2 tbsp of chopped coriander
- 1tsp of cumin
- 1 tbsp sea salt/kosher salt
Method
- Put tomatoes, onions, peppers, apples, vinegar and salt in a large pan and bring to the boil.
- Once boiling reduce the heat and simmer for 1 hour, stirring occasionally. Leave the pot uncovered. The mix should thicken over the time.
- Stir in the chillis, coriander and cumin and simmer for a further five minutes.
- Blend the mix (I used a stick blender although you could do it in batches using a food processor). Don’t blend too much, a slightly Chucky mix is best.
- Put into jars and seal. I sterilised mine by washing, rinsing and then putting in the oven for 15 minutes.
Change how you cook and still enjoy what you eat. 