[Mutti – £1.50 – 9/10]
– Quality.
What a tin. Easy to find and sometimes you can get them for £1. It’s always worth it. Never lets you down. The juice is like passata, tiny skin rate, the plums always taste good, never tinny.
That’s why it’s a top tin and always will be.
I’ll eat a whole tin of these straight outta the tin for a treat.

Only downside is that they are a bit mainstream. They’re advertising a lot lately. Doing lots of pop-up activations and such. So they don’t have that charm some other tins have. It’s like the Coca Cola of tinned tomatoes.
I think. Coke always tastes good though.

How I used my tin: Pappa al Pomodoro
“Bread, tomato, cheese soup.”
Ingredients:
Bread, Tomato, Parmesan, Basil, Garlic, Olive oil
Method:
Olive oil in a pot. Cook garlic. I like to add my basil stems too, get them infused in the oil. Add tomatoes. Squish the plums up with a wooden spoon, then refill the tin with warm water and dissolve half a stock cube in it (optional) water is fine. Cook this for a bit. Then add stale bread. Ciabatta is best but any proper bread works fine. As long as it’s not shitty bread. Let that bread become soggy in the soup, it will thicken it up. Then, once it’s how you like it. Take it off the heat and grate lots of parmesan in.
Mix it in. Put it in a bowl. Basil on top and more parmesan.

[Strianese San Marzano – £3 – 8.5/10]
– A lovely tin. Aesthetically it’s nice.
Looks proper Italian doesn’t it.
The jewels themselves taste good out of the tin.
I suspect they go well in anything, I’ve also heard of pizza restaurants using them for their base, so they hold up undercooked. They didn’t blow my socks off for some reason though, probably because they cost £3 and it’s hard to live up to that.

How I used my tin: Duck Ragu
Two duck legs. Fry them skin down in a pan you’ll use the whole way.
(I like to use a wide shallow tall sided pan.) Start cold, cook until skin is crispy, doesn’t need to be cooked through. Remove them from the pan. Add a simple soffrito. Knob of butter. Cook down. Add red wine. Cook down. Add 1 tin of Strianese. Stir in. Add chicken stock, preferably homemade. Then add the duck legs back in, and simmer for a minimum of 2 hours. Once ready. Take legs out. Strip them from the bone. Then add the shredded duck back into the sauce. Now cook it down to get to your desired consistency. If it gets too thick add splashes of chicken stock to get it where you want it.
Don’t forget to season throughout.
Pepper and a bay leaf. Dash of vinegar if you want to give it some spizz.

[La Fiammante San Marzano – £2.50 – 6/10]
– Nice looking tin.
This tin exploded on my clean t-shirt when I opened it so I immediately wasn’t feeling it.
Also I’ve had La Fiammante tins before (their non San Marzano tins a few times) and I don’t love them. I don’t think they taste good enough, they’re a bit bland and have a hint of something I don’t like.

But they look very cool and are clearly very Italian and imported. So they’re probably better than British supermarket muck. BUT, saying that, I’m not sure they are actually. Hot take.

How I used my tin: Pizza
As it was a San Marzano tin and I had a bunch of dried Mozzarella in the fridge I thought I’d make a homemade pizza. I’m terrible at making pizza dough. To really make it well you need time. And I’m impatient and only really wan’t pizza impulsively.
So just follow a proper pizza dough recipe from online or a good book. And don’t do it in a rush.

[Italianavera Organic – £2.75 – 8.5/10]
– Pricey.
But really good.
Which is annoying because it’s got one of those fancy designed tins that looks like a graphic designer got their greasy hands on it. Which also annoyingly does look quite good though. I do like the tin designs. I just don’t like the feeling I might be being tricked into liking the contents because of it.

Either way these tomatoes are good.
Very tasty and tangy.
Spotless skinless tomatoes.
No citric acid sting.
Nice thick deep red sauce.

How I used my tin: Tomato Sauce – Partnered with the below tin.

Everyone knows how to make their own version of this.
Olive oil, butter, Shallot, Garlic, 2 tins of tomatoes, cook it for at least an hour. – I also added a parmesan rind and a dash of good balsamic vinegar. Good olive oil is important too.
I think tin tomatoes need at least an hour to get rid of their tinniness when making just a tomato sauce but it’s personal preference.

[Lotus Organic – £1.20 – 2/10]
– Shit
Half the price of the above tin, but more than double worse.
You should never pay 1.20 for a bad tin.

Quite a few bits of skin.
The taste of citric acid lingers in the mouth. Sauce was ok tasting but runny and pale. Sort of sauce you expect from a cheap tin.

An M&S tin is 49p and tastes better than this. If you wan’t organic I think this is the cheapest one, but if you’re going organic just spend more on a better one.
Like the one above or Waitrose Duchy.

How I used my tin: Tomato Sauce – Partnered with the above tin.
As above. I decided to use these two organic tins as they had that in common, but that was all they had. Luckily the other tin was there to save this one from making a disappointing sauce.
Below you can see a comparison between these two tins after the tomatoes have been poured out.

REGA

Coming soon

How I used my tin: