A cool and refreshing way to drink your veggies: this easy homemade tomato vegetable juice is like V8 juice, but better (recipe here).
Would you rather have your refreshing summer vegetables raw? Check out my quick and easy gazpacho recipe. Is your garden full of green tomatoes that are never going to ripen? Turn them into my super simple, super popular salsa-like green tomato relish or learn how to ripen green tomatoes indoors the really easy way.
I have a sheep farmer friend who recently told me that she swears by Campbell's V8 juice when working out in the heat. She says it's more rejuvenating than drinking water or Gatorade and literally makes the difference between wanting to keel over and being able to keep going for hours.
This is the kind of stuff I need to know.
What could be even better than V8? Homemade V8! Or in this case V4, though you can add more vegetables, such as beets, carrots, tomatoes, or sweet peppers, if you like. Either way, this easy to make vegetable tomato juice will blow that V8 away. Did you know V8 juice is mostly made from water and tomato paste and salt?
Last week we put up another 180 bales of hay, on one of those insanely hot and humid days where you're drenched in sweat just walking across the farmyard, and it seems impossible that the air can be so amazingly still.
I couldn't conjure up a breeze—because there's apparently some law that says all air movement must stop while you're picking up hay—but before heading out into the hayfield, I found enough tomatoes in the garden to whip up a quick batch of this homemade vegetable tomato juice.
It definitely helped. And it also tasted delicious.
I'm sure V8's revitalizing abilities have something to do with the frightening amount of sodium it contains (because you lose so much while sweating), so this time I doubled the salt in my recipe.
I also used the Oxo Good Grips food mill I finally bought fall after lusting after one for two years. (Thanks to all of you who let me know how much you like yours!) I love it. It is so easy to use and clean, the non-stick legs work great, and the three different sized grinding discs are awesome.
To make this healthy, flavorful juice (recipe here), all you do is chop everything up and toss it into a pot, simmer until soupy, then put it through a food mill. It's the perfect way to make use of overripe, imperfect, or just plain ugly tomatoes, which you can sometimes find for a deal at farmers' markets.
And thankfully you don't have to be heading out into the hayfield to enjoy it.
© FarmgirlFare.com, where we're finally done putting up hay for the year! But hopefully we'll still be putting away a lot more homemade juice.
Do you have any suggestions for preserving the juice safely? My family lives in an apartment, with limited pantry and freezer storage space... so any processing or preservation tips would be very handy! Thanks for the great post!
ReplyDeleteAnon,
ReplyDeleteYes! There are canning instructions included at the end of the recipe. :)
My husband works for a program teaching motorcycle safety, and frequently spends 6-8 hours outside standing in a parking lot. The instructors swear by V8, and there's a huge difference in him when we forget to stock up before hand. When he forgets, he comes home and can't do anything but collapse in bed; when he brings a 6pack he comes home tired, but still functional and energized.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to offer that a 2 tablespoons of a good salsa placed in the pot to simmer & then pureed adds a bit of zip...along with a dash of tobasco
ReplyDeleteUmmm? Where is the recipe???
ReplyDeleteThe recipe is here. I link to it three times above, including in the first line of the post where it says 'recipe here.' :)
DeleteI love this recipe it is fantastic!! I just wanted to add that I used your recipe and then hand blended it THEN I ran the super thick soupy mixture through my juicer and it came out so well. The dry pulp leftover I then used as the base for a sauce. 2 birds with one recipe. I was psyched!!
ReplyDeleteI want to make this but I'm very sensitive to fresh tomatoes, would I be able to use a can of low-sodium tomatoes or would that defeat the purpose?
ReplyDeleteHi Charley Ann,
DeleteYou could certainly try it! :)
This isn't v-8; where are the EIGHT vegetables?!
ReplyDeleteI say right in the text that technically this version would be V4. On the recipe page (http://www.farmgirlfare.com/2008/10/less-fuss-more-flavor-homemade-tomato.html) I also mention several other vegetables you can add if desired (beets, carrots, etc).
DeleteBut when people are searching for a homemade V8 type, vegetable juice recipe (which they do all year long) what they search for is V8, so that's what I called it. The bottom line is that it's a delicious, much healthier version of the commercial stuff, and people who make it love it. Try it yourself and see! :)
Thank for the recipe. This looks good. I would love to make this juice soon ;)
ReplyDelete