Tomato Confit
December 28th, 2009by Lisa
For two years now, I’ve served my Christmas filet with tomato confit. It’s totally delicious, sweet, herbaceous, jammy concoction that is pretty and complex enough for your holiday table.
But every year I have way too much left over. This year, I halved the recipe and still had too much, and so when we were fatigued from eating meat (the very next day) I used the leftover confit to dress pan fried gnocchi, and on the next day it dressed the leftover (but not-yet cooked) shell pasta from the Christmas Eve Fish Soup.
The results were so good and so appreciated by the family, that I’ve resolved to periodicaly make big batches of this confit and use it for all sorts of things like:
- quick pasta sauce
- quick gnocchi sauce
- to dress inexpensive cuts of beef (think skirt steak or strip steak or london broil, etc.)
- to top hamburgers on or off the bun
- to top meat loaf before cooking
- I’m sure you can find other things to do with this….any firm-fleshed white fish like halibut could handle this as well…
The confit will freeze, so you can freeze smaller family-sized portions for another quick, fast, and a little-bit elegant weeknight meal. It might even remind you of something special, like Christmas.
Tomato madeira confit
- 8 large garlic cloves
- 1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
- 4 (14-ounce) cans diced tomatoes, drained
- 1/2 teaspoon finely chopped thyme
- 1/2 teaspoon finely chopped rosemary
- 1/2 California or 1 Turkish bay leaf
- 1/4 teaspoon sugar
- 1 cup Madeira (preferably Verdelho), divided (you can also substitute a red or white wine; taste will vary, but it will still be good)
- 1/4 cup water
Cook garlic in oil in a large heavy skillet over medium-low heat, turning occasionally, until golden, 10 to 15 minutes. Add tomatoes, thyme, rosemary, bay leaf, sugar, 1/4 teaspoon table salt, 1/8 teaspoon pepper, and 1/2 cup Madeira and briskly simmer, stirring frequently and crushing tomatoes with a heatproof rubber spatula, until tomatoes start to break down and oil separates slightly, about 1 hour.
Mash garlic into tomatoes with spatula, then stir in 1/4 cup Madeira. Discard bay leaf.
If you’re roasting anything, be sure to deglaze the pan and add the drippings to the confit before serving.