Cookery Book Shelf

Paul Bertolli's Tomato Essence

We've made this essence with the last of our tomatoes.

Essence

Unlike [tomato] soups, which are blended purée of the whole tomato - pulp, juice, gel, and what can be pushed from the skin - "tomato water" is the essence of tomato flavor. After crushing the fruit, it is wrapped in cheesecloth and suspended over a catch pan. What drips free is the delicately tinted blood of the fruit. It makes a very refreshing soup with the limpid appearance of a consommé.

Four pounds of ripe, very juice tomatoes will yield about 1 quart of essence. Add a little salt and paddle them in a mixer until you achieve a runny slurry of pulp and juice. To ensure that the essence runs clear, you will need to pass it through multiple layers of cheesecloth. Line a colander or basket sieve with five double layers, pour in the crushed tomatoes, and bring the four corners of the cloth to the center. Tie two opposite corners together, then the two others, and insert the handle end of a wooden spoon under the knots, hobo-style. Suspend the tomato bundle over a non-reactive pot deep enough to allow the tomato sack to hang free of the juice it exudes and refrigerate it overnight. (The pulp and skin left inside the cheesecloth may be reserved for a second rendering for use in a quick sauce, or as the aromatic basis of a broth or braise.

To make chilled soup from the tomato water, simply correct it for salt and add a few garnishes. My preference, in keeping with the clean transparency of tomato water, is for paper-thin slices of cucumber, thin sliced green onion or thin spikes of chive, and a scattering of fragrant green herbs such as chervil, tarragon, or basil. One quart makes 6 portions.

One outstanding use of tomato water is for crystalline aspics. It is of course possible to make a natural jelly of tomato using veal bones in the classic method, but this would necessitate cooking it for an extended period of time. The point of tomato water is that it is a raw essence. Instead, use 1 level tablespoon of powdered gelatin for every pint of tomato water. (If you prefer an entirely vegetal aspic, use a small amount of agar, which is a seaweed-based gelatin.)

To incorporate the gelatin, ladle off about 1 cup of tomato water, pour it into a bowl, and sprinkle the gelatin over the surface. If you are making a large quantity you will need more liquid in which to dissolve the gelatin; maintain roughly the same proportion as given above.

Allow the gelatin to soften. Pour it into a saucepan and warm it slightly while stirring slowly and constantly with a spoon so as not to introduce air bubbles until all the gelatin dissolves. Pour the dissolved gelatin back into the remaining tomato water, then pour the mixture into a glass baking dish and chill it until it sets.

Without any other addition, this aspic makes an elegant garnish to shellfish salads such as lobster, sea scallop and crab. Its bright flavor also adds shimmer to plates of vegetables such as cold green beans, heart lettuces, and avocado.

In the proportions given, this aspic is more tender than firm in consistency and better presented scrambled than cut.

Drag a fork through the layer, first in one direction then the other, until it pleases your eye. Then spoon it over and around the elements of the dish.