Tomato Pies!

I put up a Tomato Pie post ever fall and I have shared my recipe/process several times, but this year I took some photos along the way to hopefully explain it better. Recipe and included below. I made 10 pies, so keep that in mind when you see the quantities.

One of my favorite things to do with end of season tomatoes is to make tomato pies with sweet onions to freeze and enjoy over the winter. You can use end of season tomatoes that you pick and let ripen inside. These are not always great to eat fresh, but they will cook up well. You can also use store bought Roma or plum tomatoes. The key to a good tomato pie is to dry the tomatoes a bit first. This keeps them from being gloppy and also concentrates the bright tomato flavor. I go light with seasoning, just a little salt and a touch of garlic since I want the tomatoes to be the focus of this dish. I like to make several pies at the same time and freeze them to enjoy over the winter. We like to eat our tomato pie for breakfast or brunch with an over easy egg and a side of breakfast meat.

Ingredients

The quantities for this vary depending on how big the pies are and how many you make. I don't ever measure them and just kind of eyeball it, but I have made a guess based on one pie.

One bottom pie crust – A top crust is optional.
About 3 pounds ripe tomatoes, cut longitudinally into 1/2" thick slices. Sauce or paste tomatoes (Roma, etc. work are best) but any slicing tomatoes work.
About 2 medium sweet onions, cut longitudinally into 1/3" thick slices. Separate into rings.
About 2 cloves of fresh garlic, minced.
½ stick of butter
1/4 pound sharp cheddar cheese, grated
1/4 pound gruyere cheese, grated
1 heaping tablespoon of corn starch
kosher salt

Optional:
About 1/4 to 1/2 cup diced peppers – you can use poblano, green bell, red bell and/or jalapeno.
Bacon or ham.

Prepare the ingredients:

Put the sliced tomatoes on a lightly oiled rack over a baking pan, lightly salt them, and dry them in the oven at about 150 to 175 degrees for 4 hours hours until they have dried out some and a skin has formed If you have a convection oven, this helps speed up the process. You can also put them in a dehydrator or use the dehydrate setting on your oven if you have that available. You don't want them to be like leather, just dry to the touch and firm.

Make or buy a standard pie crust. A flour rolled crust (versus a press in crust) works best as it does not get soggy and fall apart, particularly if you are going to freeze and thaw.
Lightly blind bake the pie crust until it is firm, but not browned. Let it cool.

Melt the butter in a heavy bottomed pan over low heat. Sweat the onions and garlic (and peppers if using) until slightly limp. Salt to taste. Do not carmelize or burn the onions or garlic. When done, let the onion, and garlic mixture cool.

Combine the grated cheeses and toss with the corn starch.

Assemble the pies:

In each blind baked pie crust, add layers of: tomatoes, onion mixture, and layer of cheese mixture. Press it down. Repeat. If you have extra tomatoes you can decoratively arrange them on the top so they are not touching.

Adding an upper pie crust is optional. If I do this I generally make a lattice crust.

Bake the pie:

If freezing: Bake the pie(s) for about 45 minutes on the bottom rack of the oven at 325 degrees, loosely covered with a piece of tinfoil to prevent excessive browning. Remove from the oven and let cool on a rack. Place in the freezer uncovered until the pie firms up, then cover with parchment paper cut to the cover the pie and then cover tightly with heavy duty tinfoil. Place back in the freezer.

If eating immediately: After the initial bake, remove the tin foil and bake for 10 to 15 more minutes until the crust and cheese layer is brown and the pie is bubbly. Remove from the oven and let cool on a rack until at room temperature.

Reheating: Remove from freezer and let the pie thaw. Remove the foil and parchment paper. Bake for 30 minutes at 325 degrees until hot and the crust and cheese is browned. Let cool to room temperature.

Refrigerate any uneaten portion.