NY Times had an article yesterday extolling the increased depth of flavor obtained if you include some of the vines and a few leaves when you cook tomato dishes. Frankly, I thought it was nonsense. Reader comment was mixed.
Do any of you do that?
Here is a link to the article, but it is behind a paywall. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/26/dining/tomato-vine-soup-recipe.html
This is an excerpt:
For bigger, bolder flavor, try cooking with their vines. While you’re at it, if you grow your own, save some of the leaves the next time you prune your plants and add them to your dishes. Both lend a surprising depth to brothy curries, soups *and braises, accentuating the fruit’s aroma. Just be sure to toss them before serving, as you would bay leaves or a tea bag…*Thanks to those leaves and vines, this quick, nourishing soup captures the acidic-sweet brightness and floral aroma of fresh tomatoes.
by NPKzone8a
16 Comments
I thought nightshade foliage was poisonous. Only the fruit is edible. No?
That would be a no from me. It is not advised to eat the leaves or vines because of the glycoalkaloids.
The smaller leading leaves ground up with some garlic and olive oil are delicious and very flavourful in small amounts
I wouldn’t use the older leaves as they are too toxic.
My husband told me about an article that he read recently which stated that cooking the leaves makes them safe for consumption. But just…no. I LOVE the scent of tomato leaves, especially in the spring when you’re just planting. Don’t want them in my mouth though.
I’m going to try it! The recipe looks delish (will make it veg though.
Apperently the flavor is delicate, so you want to use them at the last 10 minutes of cooking.
Start small first with green tomatoes as well to see if there are any reactions.
The leaves have the same alkaloids as green fruit, but at a higher concentration.
Sounds like advice from AI
When we make sauce we dump the tomatoes into a crockpot to cook for 8-10 hours, and if stems are there it’s cool. Will use immersion blender to purée everything and sometimes strain it. So stems are ok, but we don’t allow leaves.
Ya this is a thing. [America’s Test Kitchen covered it awhile back](https://youtu.be/I0kr15DYHNU?si=Ad9G8s33fjeu9vy0). I haven’t tried it though.
One of the Serious Eats tomato sauce recipes calls for a small green branch or two for the last few minutes of stewing.
When I’ve had the time, I’ve done this. It adds a bit of the volatiles that give the “fresh tomato” taste that are lost after the relatively long cook down of the stewed and roasted tomatoes.
No sickness yet from a few years of doing this …
My tomatoes have enough big juicy flavor. I dont think I would risk eating the stems and leaves. I guess if you have to eat store or junk tomatoes with no flavor, that might be different, but I dont have to and probably won’t risk it. Food scientists and chefs contradict each other so much that it’s hard to know who is right.
No. Just no.
I was thinking about putting tomato leaves in my dehydrator for a bit of oomph. Funny this just showed up right now💜😊
The plants have Solaninie – no way would I cook with that – it’s what makes green potatoes toxic.
I may have spelled it wrong….but do not do it….
Well, a lot of food prep/cooking is about making potentially dangerous things safe to eat. We cook meats because they’re risky to eat raw. We eat beans with toxins (after soaking and rinsing). We eat things like blowfish and cassava which are potentially thousands of times more toxic than tomatoes, by prepping them properly. Heck, pretty much everything fresh that’s from the grocery store needs to be soaked and rinsed to get all the pesticides off. It’s all about finding ways to make things safe before putting them into our bodies.
That said, I don’t know whether the writer of the article knows what he’s doing, so it’s a pass from me.
Nope, tomato leaves give me terrible skin contact allergies no way am putting them inside me.