Color us merry gentlemen. In the garden, August is like Christmas. But, unlike that celebration, we get to collect gifts every day throughout August. The peppers, the tomatoes, the cucumbers—with a little care and attention, they just keep a-coming.

Last spring, ambition coursed through our veins as we endeavored to grow all of our tomatoes from seed. We succeeded—possibly too well. Besides our evident good looks and charm, we have hearts of gold. We brought those tomato plants into this world, but we lacked the coldness to take any out of it.

Our garden, our patio and all other spots with full sunlight abound with tomato plants. And now, we’re harvesting more tomatoes than friends and family can consume. Waste not, though. Take a lesson from past generations—you know, the pioneers. By preserving today’s bounty, we can indulge throughout the long, hard winter.

We’ve mastered salsa. We’ve developed an original recipe for G@H pasta sauce. Spicy ketchup? Of course. Most handy, though, are dried tomatoes. By drying a tomato, we create a robust little flavor bomb which can be dropped into all kinds of foods. Roma tomatoes work best. Cherry tomatoes provide a touch more sweetness.

Depending on size, cut the tomatoes into halves or quarters. Toss them in olive oil and your choice of spices. We prefer dried basil and onion power. A dehydrator does the job most safely and efficiently, but you can use an oven or the sun. Keep drying the tomatoes until they lose all swishiness.

Store the tomatoes in an airtight container in a cool dry place. When cooking with dried tomatoes, you needn’t do anything special if adding them to a liquid. Otherwise, we coat them in olive oil about two hours before use to reconstitute them. Be sure to save that olive oil to use in your recipe.

We top our pizza with dried tomatoes. We toss them in our pasta. We blend them in our hummus. All year round, we delight in the taste of August.