Ketchup!

Growing things in our backyard has caused me to look up many recipes that use: cucumbers, tomatoes, basil, thyme, parsley and mint.  I'm drinking cucumber mint water as I type this because, seriously, one can only eat so many cucumber spears, even tasty fresh ones.

What to do with 4 pints of cherry tomatoes about to burst?  Perusing various websites and blogs, I came up with some great ideas.  Sadly, it seemed highly unlikely that my children would eat any of these things, since they're currently in a "familiar food only" phase.

Except, KETCHUP!  They eat lots of ketchup.  And 4 pints of cherry tomatoes makes 2 cups of ketchup, so I wouldn't even have to worry about jarring it.  The concept of actually making ketchup was so novel, I had to document it.

Wm chopped about half before he lost interest
 

They wanted to taste and smell all the ingredients

Patch helped pour it all in,
then we simmered for about an hour

Wm did the blending (but no pics of him during,
since I had to make sure ketchup didn't splash everywhere)

Final step was pushing through a sieve.  A quick poll of my Wellesley FB group suggested this was not entirely necessary, but the boys thought the seeds in the ketchup was too weird, so I did.

Of course, having fresh ketchup (currently chilling in the fridge) requires hamburgers and hot dogs for dinner.  Getting the grill ready right now!