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If you have ever encountered a recipe which requires you to remove tomato skins and seeds by hand then you will know what a fiddly and time-consuming task this can be. Smart chefs know there is a better alternative in the form of manual and electric tomato presses. Also known as tomato strainers, these handy kitchen gadgets take all the hard work out of tasks like making your own pasta sauce from scratch by turning a tedious task into a simple one involving little more than the push of a button, or in the case of manual tomato presses, the turn of a hand crank.

Tomato presses are used for straining the juice and pulp out of a tomato, separating this desirable extract from the unwanted skin and seeds. The tomatoes are fed into the top of the tomato strainer where they are pulled into a grinding mechanism which grinds up the tomatoes and pushes them through a strainer screen. The holes in this screen are small enough to enable juice and pulp to pass through but not skin and seeds which are discarded out the side of the machine.

Tomato strainers come in two main types, which are either user powered in the form of a hand crank manual tomato press or motor powered in the form of an electric tomato press. The hand cranked versions of these tomato sauce makers are the cheaper of the two and can be bought for under $50 for a good quality machine and these are suitable for extracting the juice and pulp out of several pounds of tomatoes at a time. However, if you usually work with bushells of tomatoes when you get into your pasta sauce making, then you will undoubtedly be better off buying an electric tomato press. Hand cranking your way through many pounds of tomatoes is certainly doable but your arms will certainly appreciate a motor doing the work for you and it'll definitely be faster.

The Manual Tomato Press

Should I Buy A Hand Turned Tomato Grinder?

Hand turned tomato presses are ideal for when you have a relatively small amount of tomatoes or other fruit and vegetables to process. If you have bushel loads then you are going to be better off buying an electric food strainer instead.

This type of tomato strainer requires the user to operate the grinding machinery by turning a crank handle. You cut the tomatoes up into quarters and drop them into a hopper on top of the machine. Then, you turn the handle manually and they are ground up by the machine with the good pulp and juice being pushed through a perforated strainer whilst the unwanted seeds and skin are discarded out the other side.

It's a lot faster than peeling and seeding tomatoes by hand and like all food strainers, they can be used for more than just tomatoes which makes them one of the most versatile kitchen utensils you can buy. By switching out the strainer attachment many food strainers can be used as a tomato press, or a berry strainer to process fruit for pies, and preserves for example, or with a quick perforated strainer replacement, you can switch to an applesauce maker or even use it to make mashed potatoes with ease.

One of the best rated manual turn food strainers is the

Roma Food Strainer and Sauce Maker

which you can see is reviewed and can be seen in action in the video which follows below.

The Electric Tomato Press

Automatic Tomato Presses Save Your Arms

Manual tomato presses are great when you are making a couple of jars of pasta sauce or making pumpkin pie for your neighbors or church fete but when you have some serious processing to do, then you really should consider an automatic food strainer instead. Electric tomato presses do not feature the hand crank seen in manual machine but are instead powered by a small electric motor. This drives the tomato grinder mechanism at a faster speed than you would choose to turn a handle and isn't going to get tired either.

Electric tomato presses are however, more expensive than turn handle operated food mills but they do take a large part of the effort out of your home canning and sauce making activities as well as saving you even more time by automating the tomato milling part. If you haven't got help in the kitchen, then you have to keep stopping to turn the handle but with an electric food mill, you just drop the fruit in the top and let the machine do all the grinding and straining.

If you are a gardener who grows a lot of produce each year and spends many hours in the kitchen canning and processing those fruits and vegetables then an electric tomato press and food strainer is exactly what you need. You will be able to find anything from commercial food strainers to less powerful but more affordable electric tomato presses for the home kitchen which will shave hours off the time it takes to manually can foods and make your own jelly. One of the more highly recommended automatic food strainers for the home kitchen can be found below.