Has anybody else ever seen or tried this? I think I saw it out of a train in Italy once; a regular 4x8 sheet FULL of mashed tomatoes in full sun. Would they have to do it all in one day, or just cover at night? Anybody... hope I didn't dream it... thanks.

I know this post is old but just read it and probably redundant now but I don't know why anyone (even italians) would try to dry tomatoes for paste. It just doesn't make sense.

What you probably saw was, yes tomatoes mashed down and being dried, but not into paste.

There are many ways to dry tomatoes, accessible on Google, or you can by a food dehydrator that works well. There is also a system for drying in your oven by leaving the door open, on a low heat and utilitizing a fan to circulate the air for fast drying. Bon apetite !