Making Tomato Powder at Home

I have had a busy summer and now ready to share what I have been up to. I have been intrigued with tomato powder and decided it was time to attempt to make some. These two bottles represent the dried tomato skins from about 20 pounds. You can imagine how the flavour is condensed.

My plan is to use this flavour rich tomato powder in soups and stews to add flavour. I plan to make fresh pasta that will have this added. That should offer me a red coloured pasta with flavour. Won't that be fun!

I peeled 20 pounds of roma tomatoes for salsa making and decided to use these skins for tomato powder.

I laid out the tomato skins on racks to dry. They took so much time. Much more time that I imagined. The skins would stick together and every day I would toss them up to separate. After about 10 days I thought they were ready for grinding.

I did grind them in my Vitamix but the mixture still had moisture. I laid out this first grind on a baking sheet and dried it again. This time for 3 or 4 days. Then I put it back in my blender and the result was exactly as I had hoped. It was fine and dry. It was ready to bottle and save.