Skinning tomatoes

I mentioned the skinning of tomatoes in my chicken Basquaise recipe. You drop the tomatoes into boiling water, leave them for 20 seconds or so, let them cool (or refresh them under cold water), and peel off the skin. There is no need to score them first.

Recipes often tell you to deseed the tomatoes before chopping them. This is a very chefy thing to do. About half of the vegetable (or fruit, if you prefer) seems to go into the bin. You might put the pulp into a sieve, in order to discard only the seeds; but writers who claim that the seeds are acrid possess tastebuds of a sophistication, or fussiness, in a different league from mine.

I like one of Nigel Slater's recipes for tomato sauce: you make your base, with oil and garlic say, and add roughly chopped -- skins and all -- tomatoes. When the sauce has reduced, you pass it through a vegetable mill, which traps the skins.