Ketchup!

Remember that time I was talking about how my house has been completely inundated with tomatoes, and they're filling up all the bowls in the house and more just keep coming? Talk about champagne problems, right?

I only seem to be complaining though, because its forced us to think of all kinds of creative things to do with tomatoes. We canned them. We dried them. We made them into paste. We made them into salsa, and shakshuka sauce, and canned those. Last week I made tomato jam, which I forgot to document for the blog but which I not cannot stop eating. Now, there's ketchup.

I don't usually eat ketchup. (Unless, like, we're camping and then all bets are off). But this ketchup is a revelation. Its sweet and a bit spicy, and tastes like cinnamon and cloves and a million other things you can't quite place. It tastes like the ketchup I am familiar with but is infinitely better. There is way more going on in this ketchup then in your traditional Heinz 57.

And really, if you'll forgive me a rant, when you start cooking things yourself this keeps happening. You try your creation, say for example, ketchup. You pause for a moment to appreciate. Then you look back at the crap they pass off at ketchup in the grocery stores (which is all corn syrup and color) and you're like, what the hell? Maybe you feel like you've been lied to, all this time.. But I digress.

Most of the ketchup recipes we found online contained Worcestershire sauce, which as it turns out, contains anchovies and thus, isn't vegetarian. We feed a lot of vegetarians around here, so we had to stray somewhat off the beaten path.

You need:
1 tsp coriander seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp mustard seeds
1 large onion, chopped
10 cups chopped tomatoes
1/3 cup red wine vinegar
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
2-3 tbsp molasses
2-3 tbsp maple syrup
2 tbsp brown sugar
1 whole head of garlic, roasted
2 hot chili peppers, chopped
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp allspice
2 cloves, whole
2 tbsp tamarind paste
olive oil (to fry onions/toast spices - maybe 2 tbsp?)
2 lovage sprigs (optional, or use celery)
1 bay leaf
1/2 tsp black pepper
2 tsp salt

1. Fry mustard seeds until they stop popping, add crushed cloves, coriander, cumin - remove from heat.
2. Put all the spices in a coffee grinder/food mill and grind to a powder.
3. Fry onion until lightly browned, add hot peppers.
4. Put the onions and peppers in a pot with the tomatoes, then add all of the other ingredients except for the lovage and the bay leaf.
5. Cook for 10 minutes, then blend with an immersion blender.
6. Add bay leaf and lovage/celery stalks, cook for 1/2 an hour. Remove lovage leaf/celery stalk.
7. Cook for another 90 minutes, or until it looks sufficiently ketchupy.

If you plan to can the ketchup, add it to sterilized mason jars and immerse in a hot water bath for 35 minutes (for pint jars).