tomatoes

It’s easy to take ketchup for granted. To just assume it will always be there. But once our all-American burger and fries arrive, if we don’t have ketchup we have a problem.

(click here for the word file) At the 12th annual Butte Bouldering Bash a few weeks back, rock climbers gathered to scramble up the crystal-flecked boulders that sprout from the earth along the Pipestone section of Montana’s continental divide. Climbing requires a lot of nourishment. Carbohydrates to keep you going,…

These are the gazpacho days of summer, when anyone can be a vegetarian with barely an effort. Even the most dedicated carnivore might find themselves satisfied, at the end of a meat-free meal, and not even realize it.  I’m that way with Greco Roman Caprese.

The middle of winter can be a tough time for tomato lovers. We are about as far away from the end of last season as we are from the beginning of this summer’s harvest, and no member of the produce kingdom suffers such a noticeable lack of flavor when it’s imported, out of season, from some faraway place.

A properly put together BLT is the Bruce Lee of sandwiches. It’s lean and light and full of fight.

What better way to say goodbye to summer than with a tomato? The orbs of August haven’t disappeared yet, and until they get bonked by the inevitable frost, they will persist, happily ripening in the crisp air. And I will be clinging to those sweet and savory fruit like summer…

Pasta Clemenza made with cannoli-like pasta Leave the Gun. Take the Cannoli. — Pete Clemenza In The Godfather, by Mario Puzo, is a scene where Pete Clemenza shows Michael Corleone how to make spaghetti and meatballs. Clememza was the smoothest character in the story, after the Godfather himself, of course,…

When August hits, I make a point to enjoy summer like it’s going out of season. Some of my favorite ways of doing so involve tomatoes, and I treat it like my job to eat a year’s worth of the ripest, juiciest, most delicious tomatoes I can get my face on.

The brief, glorious moment when tomatoes are everywhere marks the culinary apex of summer. This drawn-out, tomato-ey solstice is especially fleeting for heirloom tomatoes, the high-maintenance wing of the tomato clan. Too watery and delicate to preserve, heirlooms can only be enjoyed raw. Which means they must be enjoyed now.

My first kitchen job involved making six gallons of gazpacho every Sunday. This was back when earning your chops meant something, and making that whole batch with just a knife and peeler, no blender, was the most tedious task on my list. It was also the most popular dish on the menu. By the time I’d learned that recipe — straight out of the Moosewood Cookbook — by heart, I figured I knew everything there was to know about cold Spanish soups.