Some dishes call for peeled, and often also deseeded, tomatoes. For many dishes, like slow-cooked sauces, we don’t bother – peeling tomatoes is a slightly fiddly job. But for some dishes it really makes a difference. Find out how to easily peel them in this tip.
This used to be one of Emily’s jobs when helping Bibi in the kitchen when she was little. She used to think it was magic how the skins would simply curl off in hot water!
Tomato skins are tough to remove, and it’s almost impossible to do on most cold, raw tomatoes. To make the job easier, you need to slash the tomatoes, then cover them in boiling water, leaving them until the skins naturally start to peel off. Some tomatoes are easier to peel than others – firmer ones tend to be more difficult than softer ones. But whatever the variety and size of tomato you have, the technique to peel them is the same.
First stab the tomatoes all over with a sharp knife. For an easy peel, you need to really slash them all over on all sides – the cuts don’t need to be deep, but you do need to score the tomatoes all over. First remove the green tops/vines if there are any, then place the tomatoes in a heat proof bowl. Stab them all over with a kitchen knife until the surface is covered with little slashes, as below.
Now pour boiling water onto the tomatoes – you need it to be absolutely newly boiling hot, and the tomatoes need to be completely submerged.
Leave the tomatoes until the skins begin to naturally loosen and peel off. This will take about 5 minutes. If the skins aren’t peeling, you either have troublesome tomatoes (it happens!) or you need to stab the tomatoes a bit more. Today, our smaller tomatoes peeled beautifully really quickly, but the larger one needed a bit more persuasion.
Drain the tomatoes, taking care as the bowl will be hot, then drench in cold water to cool them enough for handling.
Place the tomatoes on kitchen paper to dry them, then gently peel off the skins.
Your tomatoes are clean and ready to chop and/or deseed as required!
