Do You Know Your Canned Tomato Products? Here's What to Look For—and What to Avoid

Do you shudder at the thought of making a fresh tomato sauce out of bland winter tomatoes? You should. Even at the absolute height of summer, it can be difficult to get a great tomato unless you grow it yourself, which leaves us with canned tomatoes. Fortunately, canned tomatoes can have an excellent flavor, and come in all sorts of varieties to suit your needs. But what's the best type to use? Below are six different versions you can find at the supermarket and how to use them.

Whole Peeled Tomatoes 

These tomatoes are peeled either by steaming or by being treated with lye, then packed in tomato juice or tomato purée. Those packed in juice are less processed and therefore more versatile (tomatoes packed in purée will always have a "cooked" flavor, even if you use them straight out of the can). Sometimes calcium chloride, a firming agent, will be added to help prevent them from turning mushy, but I prefer tomatoes packed without it. You'll also see them packed with basil leaves.

Whole peeled tomatoes generally work better than diced tomatoes in most dishes since they break down more easily. Diced tomatoes, on the other hand, typically contain calcium chloride in order to help them retain their shape. Using whole peeled tomatoes also gives you more control of the texture of the tomatoes in your dish. You can keep them whole, crush them in your hands, dice them, or purée them.

“A can of whole peeled tomatoes can become any one of the other cans, but you can't turn any of the other cans into each other, except maybe purée, which they can all be reduced to,” says Daniel Gritzer, Serious Eats’ Editorial Director. Because of this, whole peeled tomatoes work across a number of dishes, including penne alla vodka, channa masala, and shakshuka, just to name a few. 

Diced Tomatoes 

Diced tomatoes are whole peeled tomatoes that have been machine-diced, then packed in juice or purée. The main difference here is that, with a greater exposed surface area, the calcium chloride can make the tomatoes quite firm, which means they don't break down easily when cooking. This limits their uses to dishes like chilis and other recipes where a chunky texture is welcome.

Crushed Tomatoes 

This type of canned tomato can vary wildly from brand to brand. There are actually no controls on the labeling of crushed tomatoes, so one brand's "crushed" may be a chunky mash, while another's is a nearly smooth purée. Because of this, it's generally better to avoid crushed products, opting instead to crush your own whole tomatoes by hand or in the pan with a wooden spoon. If you do choose to use crushed tomatoes, you can incorporate them in a hearty chili or eggs in purgatory.  

Tomato Purée 

This is a cooked and strained tomato product. It makes a good shortcut for quick-cooking sauces, but your sauce will lack the complexity you get from slowly reducing less processed tomatoes. We recommend leaving the purée on the shelf.

Passata

Passata is like bottling up the best tomatoes summer has to offer. It’s a type of tomato purée made from fresh, in-season tomatoes as a way to preserve harvested tomatoes all year long. The difference between passata and tomato purée is that the latter has been cooked down to a thick consistency with a sweet tomato flavor, while the former is only minimally simmered, so it lends its brightness to sauces, soups, and stews. Passata has a smooth but thin consistency, so it’s best used as a base in cooking rather than a direct replacement for sauce. 

You can find passata at the grocery store next to other tomato products, usually in jars or boxes. It’s normally seasoned with salt and sometimes basil, though we recommend buying brands without the basil so you have more control over the flavor of your dish.   

Tomato Paste 

Tomato paste is concentrated tomato juice. Fresh tomatoes are cooked, then the larger solids are strained out and the resulting juice is slowly cooked down to a moisture content of 76% or less. Tomato paste is great for adding a strong umami backbone to stews and braises, as well as for thickening them slightly.

The Takeaway

You can find a variety of canned tomato products at the grocery store, but most of our recipes call for whole peeled tomatoes—since they can be used whole, crushed, diced, or puréed—and tomato paste, which is great for adding a concentrated tomato flavor to your dishes. Diced tomatoes contain calcium chloride to retain their shape, so they don’t break down as easily in cooking. Crushed tomato products are inconsistent across brands, but you can generally use them in chilis or sauces if you find one you like. Canned tomato purées are already cooked, so they won’t give your dishes the same nuanced tomato flavor that other products will, but passata offers a brightness in sauces, soups, and stews.