We eat a lot of relishes, chutneys and pickles, but it’s not something we’ve ever tried to make so today I decided I’d have a bit of a look around the internet to see what was involved with the aim of using up the last of the marmande tomatoes from our greenhouse (well I say the last – just the last from the batch I picked this week there are a whole lot more).

Looking at recipes online, it didn’t look too difficult so I thought, hey why not? And it turned out quite tasty so I thought I’d share it with you and maybe if you’ve fancied trying your hand but haven’t been brave enough, this might give you the courage.

Ingredients

• 1kg of tomatoes
• 500g of onions
• 2 tbsp tomato puree
• 1 red chilli
• 1/2 tsp smoked papkrika
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 4cm piece of ginger
• 250g sugar
• 150ml red wine vinegar

What to do

It’s dead easy.

Slice the onions and throw them in a pan and caramalise them.

While that’s happening, take the skins off the tomatoes (make a cross in the bottom then put them in boiling water for 30 seconds. Take them out and plug them in ice water for 30 seconds. The skin comes right off) and chop them up.

Chop the garlic, ginger and chilli.

Once the onions are caramelised, put everything in a pan and simmer for an hour, stirring frequently. Really frequently, you really really don’t want to let this burn.

Once it goes dark and “jammy” it’s ready.