Ok-so now I have tomatoes everywhere

So, I've been looking for recipes for tomatoes, and come up with quite a few. Have you ever heard of tomato pie? Not me. But I'm gonna try it. I'm also going to check out Homemade catsup, BBQ sauce, tomato paste, and tomato jelly. But tomatoes don't just taste good.

Tomatoes have lycopene in them which is very good for you. It is said to lower blood pressure, can help reduce blood LDL cholesterol (the "bad" cholesterol). At a recent conference, researchers presented findings on lycopene's potential protection against male infertility, osteoporosis, skin cancer, varicose vein removal , eye disease, prostate, breast and endometrial cancers. Wow!

In raw tomatoes however, lycopene is tightly bound to indigestible fiber. So eating raw tomatoes provides relatively small amounts of  lycopene.The best food sources of lycopene according to the Tomato Research Council in New York City: ( Amount of lycopene in one ounce) Tomato Sauce, Spaghetti Sauce, Ketchup (5 mg); Tomato Soup, Canned Tomatoes, Tomato Juice, Vegetable Juice (3 mg); Minestrone Soup, Vegetable Soup, Pink Grapefruit (1 mg). But that's not all.

In addition, lycopene is good for the skin.  It is good for oily, acne prone skin. It is an anti-inflammatory with  a gentle exfoliating effect. Heck, it's even supposed to have anti-aging effects!  (I'm not making this stuff up...I promise!)

So, in addition to tomato food products, I'm going to make tomato face products. Woohoo!

Today, I made my first batch homemade tomato soap.

I have never made soap before. It's actually quite amazing. You make it basically with oils and lye. Yup-the stuff you can use to unclog your sink. I know my grandmothers used to make lye soap. They used it to clean clothes. You have to mix the lye with water and it gets hot.

In the mean time you heat your oils.

 Once they're at the right temperature, you mix them. And mix and mix til it gets the right consistency.

It's called 'trace' in homemade soap talk.

Now it's ready to turn into tomato soap. The other day I dried a bunch of tomatoes. (I forgot to take pics). Today I ground them into a very coarse powder like this:

I added them to the soap. Along with a scent and tea tree oil (also good for the skin). Then I poured it into the mold.

Tomorrow it's supposed to be ready to un-mold and cut into bars. Then it has to dry for a few weeks. If any of you want to purchase a bar from the maiden voyage of Tomato Shed soap-making, let me know. But don't worry, I'll try it out on myself first.

Tootles!