Tomato Paste 4.5kg

At the current pack price of $12.50, the pack holds about $0.39 worth for every 140g — the weight of a standard small tin. Prices move, so take the pack price from the product page and compare it against whatever the small tins cost you.

Not necessarily, and it depends entirely on whether you portion and freeze it. Frozen in tablespoon-sized cubes it keeps for months and you use exactly what a recipe asks for. Left in the fridge as one large container it will not get through. The freezer space is the real question, not the quantity.

Decant it out of the tin immediately — food should not be stored in an opened can. Put roughly a week's worth in a sealed container in the fridge, and freeze the rest in small portions. An ice cube tray gives you roughly one tablespoon per cube, which is the amount most recipes call for; freeze the tray, then bag and date the cubes. Always follow the storage directions on the pack itself.

Go by the storage directions on the pack rather than a general figure, and keep it sealed, cold and free of spoons that have been elsewhere. Pouring a thin film of oil over the surface slows the darkening at the top. If you are not confident of getting through it, freeze it instead.

Yes, and with a pack this size it is the sensible approach. Portion it into an ice cube tray, freeze, then transfer the cubes to a labelled bag with the date on it. They go straight into a hot pan from frozen.

Concentration. Paste is tomatoes cooked right down, so a spoonful carries a lot of flavour. Purée is thinner and less reduced — though British and New Zealand labels often use "purée" for what Americans call paste, so check the picture. Passata is sieved, unreduced tomato: pourable, and the base of a sauce rather than an addition to one. Tinned chopped tomatoes keep their texture.

It is a measure of soluble solids — in practice, how far the tomatoes have been reduced. A higher figure means a thicker, more concentrated paste. Where a listing gives a Brix figure, that is what it is describing.

It makes a difference. A minute or two frying in hot oil with the onions, until the paste darkens a shade, deepens the flavour. Stirred raw into a finished sauce it tends to taste raw.

At a pinch. Roughly one part paste to three or four parts water gives you something usable. It is not the same as passata, which is unreduced and fresher, but it will get a dish finished.

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