Have Garden, Will Trade for Sausage

Last year I began trading some of the produce we grow in our kitchen garden here in the District of Columbia for venison a neighbor harvests on a family farm in Virginia. So far we had received two large packages of venison stew meat and some tenderloin. My last gift to them was a box full of pickles and preserves, a sampling of the many jars we had left over from the summer.

The neighbors said they were enjoying the pickles and hinted that more venison was on the way, this time in the form of some sausages. "It's being processed now," they said.

Then one night a figure appeared at the store carrying a strange looking load. I turned on the porch light and had a long, frozen package thrust in my direction. When I unwrapped it, this is what I found: two 20-inch long venison summer sausages, the biggest sausages I've ever seen.

Truthfully, I wasn't expecting much from this sausage. As you can see from the label, it was processed for private consumption only. There are big letters indicating "Not For Sale." I thought it would be dry and tasting of who knows what. But that just shows you how little I know about venison sausage. This summer sausage is some of the best stuff I've ever tasted, moist and meaty and--how to say this--barely distinguishable from the finest beef sausage.

That leaves just one question: what to do with two 20-inch long sausages?

I decided we should start eating some immediately, put some away in the freezer and share the rest with friends. So after the sausage defrosted, I cut it into portions. And began eating...I think I have a new favorite high-protein snack.

Meanwhile, the neighbors will be getting two fine tomato plants. We are growing them now and soon will be planting them in the garden. They'll be able to come by any time and pick what they like. Does that sound like a fair trade to you?

A New Season on the Farm

This is the first in what we hope will be a regular series of articles about Leigh Hauter and his CSA operation at Bull Run Farm in The Plains, Virginia. Leigh has been farming in the Washington area for 15 years, first at the Cheseapeake Bay Foundation's Clagett Farm in Prince George's County. He was involved in early efforts to bring a farmers market to underserved residents of the District of Columbia east of the Anacostia River. Leigh now has about 500 subscribers to his CSA. His wife Wenonah is executive director of the advocacy group Food and Water Watch.

Signs of life are beginning to appear on the farm. For Leigh Hauter, that means ramping up the heating system in his greenhouse--fixing leaky pipes, lighting the furnace and planting seeds.

A constant temperature of at least 70 degrees is necessary to prompt germination in thousands of pepper and eggplant seeds. Leigh has a fairly new, high-efficiency furnace fired by the wood that grows on the farm. The system runs hot water--90 to 100 degrees--through copper pipes under his seed trays, giving the seeds a nice warm bed in which to sprout and keeping the greenhouse toasty when nighttime temperatures dip.

Leigh is aiming for a last frost date of April 15, so he's planting things now that typically require at least eight weeks in seed trays before they can be safely transplanted outdoors. That means peppers and eggplants by the thousands. He's planted at least eight different varieties of bell peppers--red, orange, purple, white among them--and more hot peppers than he can count. That will mean plenty of visual interest when subscribers open their CSA boxes later in the year.

Leigh is also starting to plant tomatoes. He hopes to be shipping two varieties of cherry tomatoes--Early Girl and Siberian--as early as the middle of June. This is also onion planting time, but Leigh does not plant his own onions. He purchases thousands of plants in bunches from a firm in Indiana. They'll be planted in the ground later.

Also at this time Leigh is planting broccoli. His customers like broccoli and unlike some other brassicas, such as cauliflower, broccoli will withstand a bit of frost. He's planning four successive crops, aiming for 1,000 plants in each spaced one week apart.

Leigh used to start his CSA deliveries in May, but at that time of the year the crops available for harvest are mostly greens. "People don't like six weeks of greens," he said, "so I'm giving them three weeks." Asked if he wasn't including spinach among his early crops, Leigh said, "I have a hard time finding spinach that doesn't bolt in this season." We have the same problem with bolting spinach. Spring in Washington gets too hot too fast.

Leigh Hauter is a former English teacher whose introduction to the farm was keeping bees at the urging of his father-in-law. Leigh sold the honey at farmers markets and has since managed to make farming a full-time occupation. We'll be checking in on him on a weekly basis so that kitchen gardeners in our area can see how a professional grows beautiful, bountiful produce.

The above photo is of the greenhouse seed starting operation at One Straw Farm in Baltimore County, taken last July.

Tomato Cleanup Soup

We have so many tomatoes from our recent garden cleanup that we've had to divide them among different bus tubs that are now crowding our kitchen. There's a tub of ripening tomatoes, a tub of green tomatoes (rapidly being made into preserves) and a big bowl of Roma tomatoes destined for pasta sauce and canning.

With one eye on the ripe tomatoes, my wife found this recipe for a smoky tomato soup in the September issue of Food and Wine. The smoky flavor comes from Spanish paprika, or "pimenton de la Vera." She had to travel some miles to the local Balducci's to find it, but it was worth the trip. With generous slices of Gruyere toast on the side, this soup makes a meal. Even our daughter loved it, which is saying quite a lot these days.

1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1 onion, diced small
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 teaspoons sweet smoked paprika
3 1/2 pounds tomatoes, quartered
1/2 cup water
1 thyme sprig
1 bay leaf
coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons heavy cream
eight slices baguette, cut on an angle
2 ounces Gruyere cheese, coarsely grated

Melt butter and olive oil in a heavy soup pot. Add onion and garlic and cook over moderately high heat until tender, about 8 minutes. Add paprika and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add tomatoes, water, thyme and bay leaf. Season with salt and pepper and bring tomato mixture to a boil. Cover, reduce heat and simmer until tomatoes break down, about 15 minutes. Discard thyme sprig and bay leaf.

Puree soup in a blender until smooth. Strain soup back into soup pot, pressing on solids to extract as much liquid as possible. (This may take some time, but don't skimp on the effort as it will result in a luxuriously smooth soup.) Stir in cream and season to taste with salt and pepper.

Meanwhile, heat broiler. Place baguette slices on a baking sheet and broil until lightly toasted on both sides. Top toasts with Gruyere and broil another 30 seconds, or until the cheese is bubbly. Ladle soup into hot bowls and serve with cheese toasts.

The Great Tomato Cleanup

It is with mixed feelings that I take down our tomato plants. These 13 plants--five different varieties--have been extremely good to us, keeping us in tomatoes every day for months. In fact, they are still making tomatoes, still blossoming, still sending up new growth. But the days grow short and the nights cold. It is time to clear the beds and move on to the next thing.

We compost just about everything around our home here in the District of Columbia. We send very little to the landfill. But I do not compost tomato plants. We live in a perfect climate for various tomato diseases and our plants invariably pick up one sort of wilt or another. I don't want to introduce those diseases to our compost pile. Instead, I take great care to cut the tomato plants into small pieces, bag them and put them out with the trash. I wish it weren't so, but I can't think of another way. One tomato guru even sanitizes his metal tomato cages each season with a blow torch.

I collected another bowl this size with ripe or ripening tomatoes. These green tomatoes--many pounds of them--will make more of our favorite green tomato and apple chutney, perhaps a green tomato jam. There may even be a fried green tomato BLT in our future. These are some of the joys of fall's Great Tomato Cleanup.

KIds Can Tomatoes

We are overwhelmed with Roma tomatoes from our garden. Perhaps this is a good time to teach the kids in my "food appreciation" classes a thing or two about canning.

First job is to blanch the tomatoes in a big pot of boiling water for about 20 seconds (15 seconds is about the minimum). Chill them quickly in a bowl of cold water. As soon as they are cool enough to handle, you can start peeling away the skins.


Blanching loosens the skins. I teach the kids to make a small cut at the pointy end of the tomato, then pull the skin away in strips with the aid of their trusty plastic knives.

Once the skins are completely removed, we cut the tomatoes into quarters lengthwise, then cut the quarters into small small pieces or dice. The dice then go into a pot to be boiled for a few minutes. Ten or 12 will fill a one-pint jar. I show the kids how to ladle the tomatoes into a sterilized canning jar, add 1 tablespoon lemon juice and 1/2 teaspoon salt before screwing on the lid and processing the jar in a boiling water bath for 35 minutes.

But we also want something to snack on as a reward for all that tomato prep. So we peeled some more tomatoes and turned them into an easy pasta sauce with some sauteed onions and finely grated Parmesan cheese. A sauce of tomatoes fresh from the garden delivers uncommon flavor. The kids quickly wolfed it down.

Black Bean & Corn Salsa with Golden Cherry Tomatoes

We don't normally advocate food out of a can, especially at the peak of produce season. But beans are one thing that emerge from a tin perfectly edible, and I have no problem recommending canned black beans for this quick garden salsa. (Then again, if you want to cook your own black beans, by all means do so.)

This mix of black beans and fresh corn is familiar enough, especially with a Southwestern seasoning of cumin and cilantro. I've dressed it up a little with our own Dr. Carolyn golden cherry tomatoes. I can hardly think of a better place to show them off, in this case to go alongside some homemade crab cakes destined for a client. You could just as easily serve it next to flank steak, grilled fish or your favorite tacos.

This takes very little time, but do go to the trouble of using a freshly shucked ear of corn. Cook it in a pot of salted water, then remove the kernels from the cob. (My favorite method for this is to set a ceramic bowl, inverted, in the bottom of a large mixing bowl, then stand the corn cob on top of the bowl to cut away the kernels with a bread knife.) Mix the corn with a 14-ounce can of black beans, well rinsed, plus about 1/3 cup diced red onion. Mix in a tablespoon or two of extra-virgin olive oil, a generous splash of sherry vinegar (or lime juice), coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste. Add about 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin and 1/4 teaspoon ground coriander, or to taste. At the end, toss in a dozen cherry tomatoes, halved, and a small handful of cilantro, chopped.

This will keep very well overnight in the fridge.

Green Beans with Sauteed Cherry Tomatoes

This is a great match: our meaty, full-flavored Romanette green beans with sweet Dr. Carolyn cherry tomatoes.

We think these golden cherry tomatoes are the best ever, with an assertive sweetness and round flavor. I was happy to see our opinion confirmed in the Southern Exposure Seed Exchange catalogue. "The most flavorful yellow cherry tomato we have grown," they write. "It has an excellent balance of sugar, tartness and depth of flavor."

In case you are wondering where "Dr. Carolyn" comes from, the tomato is named for Dr. Carolyn Male, one of the country's foremost tomato experts and the author of "100 Heirloom Tomatoes for the American Garden." In fact, it was from that book that I first thought to purchase some Dr. Carolyn seeds.

We have just one plant in our garden this year, but it is covered with golden tomatoes--more than enough for us. Plus, the plant seems utterly resistant to the fungal diseases that otherwise ravage less sturdy tomato varieties in our hot, humid District of Columbia climate.

We are also in love with these Romanette beans, an Italian variety of flat bean that grows profusely on compact bush plants. So easy to grow, and so productive. They make a perfect side dish simply cooked in salted water, then dressed with olive oil and grated Parmesan cheese. But combining them with the Dr. Carolyn tomatoes results in an ecstatic mingling of late-summer flavors.

Simply get a non-stick saute pan very hot on the stove, coat the bottom with extra-virgin olive oil and drop in a small bowl full of halved cherry tomatoes. While they sizzle, season with coarse salt. Toss one or two times until the tomatoes are showing the faintest hint of brown and are beginning to melt. Then toss in cooked green beans, season with a little more salt and freshly ground black pepper. Drop in a few basil leaves cut into a chiffonade and a splash of sherry vinegar. Toss a couple of times until the beans are heated through.

The final result isn't exactly pretty, but you'll be eating it right out of the pan.

Fighting Nature

Maybe I shouldn't be so shocked, but I'm still surprised when I run across a gardener who insists on being able to control nature.

A Master Gardener friend recently contacted me asking if I knew an expert who could talk to her garden group about growing tomatoes . Noting that problems with fungi were "particularly worrisome," she threw down the gauntlet: "Need to learn more about it and how to control it."

When I suggested that the high heat and humidity in the District of Columbia provide an ideal environment for fungi, and that selecting disease resistant tomatoes might be a better strategy than trying to keep fungi out of the garden, she got downright testy. My advice was "not helpful," she said. "I have grown tomatoes for over 35 years and it is a bit more complicated than just looking for the resistant ones. The fungi has (sic) been a concern with local gardeners here and I am looking for a person who has technical info about controlling the spread and what are the options."

I guess this falls into the category of no good deed going unpunished. But it got me thinking--or rather wondering whether I am simply crazy for thinking that trying to grow tomatoes organically and avoiding fungi are not concepts that work easily together in the same sentence. And am I missing something when I can look at the varieties of tomato plants in my own garden and observe that some of them clearly are more resistant to disease than others?

First, I should say that I have very little experience with pests and diseases in my garden. I rotate my crops every year. I use lots of compost I make myself. I do very little watering. But I don't know that I've ever seen a tomato plant--either in my own garden or elsewhere--that did not experience wilt or some other common ailment at some point in its life. Fungi are everywhere, and they are the most common destroyer of plants.

I looked online and found a report from the University of Maryland stating that commercial tomato growers in the state commonly spray fungicides on their plants. But they also practice crop rotation and selection of resistant varieties.

Standard practices besides rotation are to avoid planting tomatoes where other nightshade cousins such as potatoes, peppers and eggplants were growing previously. Keep tomato plants well separated to promote good air circulation. Try to keep the foliage dry--don't water from the top down. Don't touch tomato plants when they're wet. Wash hands and tools after handling tomatoes. Remove and trash (don't compost) diseased tomato plant material. Disinfect tomato cages before reusing.

I admit, I intially was not happy about the way my Mortgage Lifter tomatoes started to wilt early in my garden this year. They are a bit unsightly, but boy are the tomatoes good--big, juicy and full of flavor. Integrated Pest Management practices would have me consider whether I can live with the wilt as long as my Mortgage Lifters are producing such great fruit. More and more I'm inclined to think the wilt is tolerable. Our Cherokee Purples and Dr. Carolyns, both heirloom varieties like Mortgage Lifter, have suffered very little. On the other hand, our Striped Zebra plants hardly grew or produced at all--they were completely overcome with wilt. (I see a battle coming, as my wife really likes Striped Zebra tomatoes and can't believe there isn't a way to grow them successfully here.) My Big Boy plant, meanwhile, which is a modern variety, not an heirloom, has survived the whole season without wilt, but the fruit isn't nearly as good at the Mortgage Lifter or Cherokee Purple.

So how do you feel about this, fellow gardeners? Is fungus something we need to control, or are there ways we can co-exist with microbes and still grow great tomatoes?

Note: Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, one of my favorite seed providers located not too far from here outside Charlottesville, Virginia, sells a more disease resitant strain of Mortgage Lifter. The fruit is said to be a little smaller, but equally as delicious.

Barbie Says, Let's Can More!

Careful what you wish for, Barbie. The ground around our Roma plants is littered with tomatoes. I have a feeling if you just gave the plants a good shake, you'd have an unending supply.

These are the pulpy, less juicy variety of tomatoes ideal for dicing and canning or turning into tomato sauce or paste. Each plant produces a phenomenal number of tomatoes. They were beginning to pile up around the base of the plants inside their cages. After collecting those, I went after the ripe ones still on the vine and realized that those were rarely still attached--they had fallen but were hung up in the foliage. Too many tomatoes even to count.

We may have enough tomatoes to last the winter. As you can see, our Romas are prolific but not necessarily large. Next year I'd like to try the famed San Marzano tomato and see how that fares. Any readers have experience with the San Marzano or care to make a comparison with the Roma?

Lunch

Plate of leftover salads: beet and tomatoes, corn salad.

Preparation time: 5 minutes

Shopping: none

We never tire of having a container of our beet salad in the refrigerator. Fresh beets from the garden, tomatoes and red onion seasoned with extra-virgin olive oil and red wine vinegar is big on flavor and utterly refreshing, especially chilled. Next to that is a simple corn salad with many of the same ingredients, plus cilantro. I could easily add to that some of the jalapeno growing in the garden. We've had some in fresh salsa and the flavor is explosive--so fruity and aromatic, and no salmonella.

I'll Take Those Three Ibuprofins

Whoever said gardening was easy?

It might not be immediately obvious, but getting our front-yard kitchen garden to look like this took the better part of the Memorial Day weekend. By the end of it, we were grilling burgers and hot dogs and sipping our gin-and-tonics, but I was bushed.

First, I harvested about 10 pounds of various mustard greens and turnip greens and Chinese greens from this bed, blanched the greens and packed them for freezing. Then I applied my usual cultivation approach to the bed--working my forked spade all around to loosen the soil, breaking up the surface with my stirrup hoe, stirring in some compost.

We are transitioning to summer. The bed is now planted with two varieties of pickling cucumbers to grow up trellises on the right, Italian marrow squash in the middle, and three types of radishes in two rows on the left.

The larger part of this bed has been lying fallow for the longest time while the onions, inter-planted with radishes on the right, grow tall. But it was finally time to transplant the tomatoes. Here we have Cherokee Purple, Dr. Carolyn and Big Boy, all comfy in their thick layer of straw mulch.

I had planted Tokyo Bekana greens, dill, arugula and lettuce behind the rhubarb, figuring they would tolerate a little shade. Well, I sort of miscalculated how fast and large the rhubarb would grow. It's very happy in its compost-amended bed. So the other plants never did much except go to seed. But I needed to clear them out of the way to prepare the soil and plant okra. (See yesterday's post.)

This bed was the scene of last year's arugula going to seed. I collected quite a load of seed pods. I'm hoping daughter will help me pick through them to collect the seeds. Then more time spent with the forked spade, the stirrup hoe and hauling buckets of compost from the compost pile before planting more tomatoes: Mortgage Lifter and Green Zebra.

I give the individual tomato plants plenty of room to breathe. They're spaced four feet apart. At the next opportunity, I'll install cages made of concrete reinforcing wire. I plan to plant some zinnias in front of the tomatoes--we always like to have some flowers in the garden--and our collection of peppers and Asian eggplant.

Visible in the far rear is the last bed I renovated for the summer. It's now planted with two Roma tomatoes and a large section of sweet potatoes. This is our first year growing sweet potatoes and I'm anxious to see how they perform in this particular bed. It's situated on the north side of the house, but in summer gets sun in the morning and late afternoon.

Yikes...just writing about all this work makes me hungry for another Ibuprofin.

Tomatoes in Trenches

A combination of factors resulted in lanky tomato plants this year. It's hard to provide enough sun for the young plants through a window. Ours is east-facing, so they get a blast of sunlight in the morning, then reflected light for part of the afternoon.

This year, though, the weather has been unusually cool and rainy, so the plants have spent more time indoors. Straining to get more sun, they grow taller and spindlier. Now that planting time has finally arrived, I've decided to try a different technique for transplanting them into the garden. Instead of digging a deeper hole to accommodate the taller tomato plants, I'll be planting them in trenches.


I dig a hole about 18 inches long and 8 inches deep. I've placed a plant, still in its pot, inside the hole to give an idea of scale.

Next, add plenty of compost to the trench. The idea is to create a kind of earthen ramp inside the hole, where it's plenty deep at one end to hold the root ball, then grows increasingly shallower toward the leafy end of the plant.

Lay the tomato plant inside the trench so that the topmost leaves have several inches of clearance from the soil surface. Tomatoes have the admirable ability to form roots all along their stems. Covering most of the stem with soil will result in lots of roots.

Cover the length of the plant with a mix of soil and compost, carefully bending the leafy end up and clear of the trench. Tamp the soil down around the plant to eliminate any air pockets. Soak the area with water.

The final step is to mulch around the tomato plant. I like straw. I like the natty look of straw in the garden. I like the fresh farm aroma. This year I'm trying the mulching method Charles H. Wilber describes in his book, How to Grow World Record Tomatoes. Wilber holds the Guiness record for tomato production relying on compost, lots of space between his tomato plants and straw mulch. He's grown plants almost 30 feet high.

Wilber cuts blocks from straw bales and lays them tight one against the other around the tomato plants. A thick layer of mulch holds moisture in the soil and suppresses weeds. Wilber recommends partially rotted straw to help feed the tomatoes.

I don't have any partially rotted bales of straw on hand. I bought two new bales from the farm supply on a trip to Annapolis. I used my fork spade to cut blocks about two inches thick from the end of a bale, and arranged the blocks around the plants in a square. The straw blocks make a tidy garden bed, and the only thing left to do is install the cages I made last year from concrete reinforcing wire.

The Struggle to Survive

Finally, I had caught up enough with chores to start disassembling the tomato cages here on our edible landscape in the District of Columbia. The tomato plants seemed to have given up the ghost weeks ago, although the reappearance of August in October stretched the growing season to unheard of lengths.



But lookey here! Two days before Thanksgiving and the tomato plants are soldiering on, making new flowers and fresh leafy growth. Tomatoes are a hot weather plant, and temperatures lately have been dipping into the 30s. We are actually below normal for a change. But the tomatoes refuse to die. I can only admire their determination.



In fact, I have recently been scraping the bottom of our last jar of last year's green tomato and apple chutney. Powerfully good stuff. Green tomatoes are utterly transformed by the addition of brown sugar, apple cider vinegar, raisins, coriander, mustard seed. We spread it on cheese with crackers. So as I started breaking down the tomato plants, I kept an eye out for green tomatoes and, sure enough, there they were. Not many, some old and gnarly, some small and very new. There were clusters of them on the cherry tomato plants. I collected those, too.



There may just be enough to make another batch of green tomato and apple chutney. On the chance others of you may have green tomatoes still to be harvested, I'm giving the chutney recipe we use, from Fancy Pantry. This chutney lasts a long time, and makes a thoughtful Thanksgiving or Christmas gift.



3 pounds completely green tomatoes

2 pounds firm, tart apples

2 cups raisin, either dark or golden

1 1/2 cups diced onions

2 teaspoons finely minced garlic

2 cups (packed) light brown sugar

1 cup granulated sugar

2 teaspoons pickling or other fine non-iodized salt

1 1/2 cups cider vinegar, plus a little more if needed

3 to 4 tablespoons finely minced fresh ginger, to taste

1 1/2 tablespoons mustard seed

2 teaspoons ground coriander

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon finely minced fresh hot red pepper, 1/2 teaspoon dried red pepper flakes, or 1/4 teaspoon (or to taste) ground hot red Cayenne pepper



Rinse and drain the tomatoes. Cut out the stem scars and any blemishes and cut the tomatoes into 1/2-inch chunks. You should have about 8 cups. Place the tomatoes in a preserving pan or heavy pot.



Peel, core and cut the apples into 1/2-inch chunks; add them to the tomatoes. Add the raisins, onion, garlic, brown and granulated sugar, salt and vinegar. Mix the ingredients well and bring the mixture to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce the heat and boil the mixture slowly, uncovered, stirring it often, for 30 minutes.



Add the ginger, mustard seed, coriander, cinnamon and hot pepper. Return to a boil, adjust the heat and continue to cook the chutney uncovered at a slow boil, stirring it often, until it holds a mounded shape when lifted in a spoon. Taste it carefully, remembering that the balance of flavors will improve as the chutney mellows in the jar; add, if needed, more vinegar, sugar, and/or salt.



Ladle the boiling-hot chutney into hot, clean pint or half-pint canning jars, leaving 1/4 inch of headspace. Seal the jars with new two-piece canning lids according to manufacturer's directions and process for 10 minutes in a boiling-water bat. Cool, label and store the jars. Let the chutney mellow for a few weeks before serving.



This is a perfect chutney to have on hand the next time you make curry. Or, as I said, a small spoonful with cheese and a cracker makes a delicious snack. It will remind you all year long why we cherish our tomatoes.

Tomatoes Gone but Not Forgotten

A stillness overtakes the garden as the plants pass their prime. Or maybe it's just lack of expectation that removes all tension from the air. The fall crops--lettuce, radishes, arugula, greens--are ready for occasional harvesting. But all the jubilant growth of summer--the real fireworks in the vegetable patch--are missing. The tomatoes, for instance, are mere skeletons of their former glory.



But there are still tomatoes. We gathered a peck of green ones and pickled them. That was an easy call. But what to do with the last of the ripe red tomatoes that are ready to drop to the ground?



These are not sauce tomatoes, but our beloved Brandywines and Cherokee Purples. I wanted to do something special with them. My wife and I hit the books and decided to make a fresh tomato ketchup and a tomato jam.



Homemade ketchup turns out surprisingly similar to store bought in appearance and consistency. The truth is in the ingredients. Reading the label on a bottle of Heinz Tomato Ketchup, I see tomatoes, distilled vinegar , high fructose corn syrup (it's in everything, no?), salt, "spice," onion powder and "natural flavoring," which very well could be some form of mono-sodium glutamate, or MSG.



Our own ketchup, following a recipe from Art of Preserving, calls for ripe tomatoes, onion, garlic, a sachet of allspice berries, peppercorns, cloves and bay leaf, white wine vinegar, granulated sugar, mustard powder and sea salt.



There is no great trick. The tomatoes, onions and garlic are all roughly chopped, then cooked in a pot with the spice sachet. When the vegetables are very soft, the spice bag is removed and the vegetables are pureed in a blender or food processor, then returned to the cook pot with the wine vinegar, sugar, mustard and salt and reduced to the desired thickness.


From four pounds of tomatoes we now have this lovely tall jar as our new tomato ketchup dispenser.



We found several intriguing recipes for tomato jam--one incorporating curry spices, another walnuts, yet another pairing tomatoes and vanilla--but we settled on a recipe for tomato jam with ginger and coriander from Fancy Pantry.

This would require canning and processing the finished jam in jars. Otherwise there is nothing complicated about it.



Remove the skins from 5 pounds firm ripe tomatoes by dipping the tomatoes individually into a large pot of boiling water for about 10 seconds. When the tomatoes are cool enough to handle, cut them in half and squeeze the seeds and pulp into a sieve set over a bowl. Save the juices, discard the seeds. Cut the tomatoes roughly and place them and the juice in a preserving pan or heavy pot.



Grate the zest (outer skin only, no pith) from two lemons and measure out 2 packed teaspoons. Add it to the tomatoes. Squeeze 6 tablespoons lemon juice and add that to the tomatoes, along with 1 tablespoon finely minced ginger and 1/2 teaspoon salt.



Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring occasionally, then lower heat and simmer uncovered, stirring occasionally, until the tomatoes are soft, about 15 minutes. Stir in 5 cups granulated sugar, raise heat and cook, stirring, until a candy/jelly thermometer reads 219 degrees, or until a small amount of the jam placed on a chilled saucer congeals quickly when refrigerated and does not run when the saucer is tilted.



When the jam is done, stir in 1 tablespoon ground coriander and remove from heat.



At this point, we ladled the jam into half-pint (1 cup) canning jars and processed the jars for 15 minutes in a boiling water bath. Curiously, the recipe from Fancy Pantry said to expect a yield of 4 cups. We ended up with 9 cups.



A delicious bonus.

Yesterday's Lunch

Proving once again that scrounging for leftovers can lead to a perfectly satisfying meal...

This tomato from the garden was just half of what was left from the night before and the fruit flies were determined to get it. You see it here cut into wedges, dressed with some Bulgarian Feta cheese that we've been whittling away at since the weekend.

Underneath is a quinoa pilaf with chickpeas and small dice of red onion, all left from making client meals on Saturday. I added some halved golden cherry tomatoes that are especially abundant in the garden just now, as well as some cilantro and freshly picked mint, everything seasoned with extra-virgin olive oil and a splash of white wine vinegar.

All this meal needs is a pinch of coarse salt and a grind or two of black pepper. To wash it down I poured a small bistro glass of my latest favoriet red wine, a 2006 Vina Borgia, 100 percent Grenache grapes from Spain, that is so drinkable and so conveniently priced for my budget--less than $6--that I bought a case of it at Whole Foods, something I almost never do.

I can't think of a better way to start the afternoon...

Roasted Tomatoes

Other than a ripe tomato fresh out of the garden, there may be nothing better than these roasted tomatoes.

I had one Roma tomato plant in my small truck patch here in the District of Columbia about a mile from the White House and it has served up one generous pasta sauce and now a second round of delicious roasted tomatoes.

This would fall more under the category of formula than recipe. Take as many Roma tomatoes as you have ripe, trim off the stem end, then slice the tomatoes lengthwise into six wedges each. Season these generously with extra-virgin olive oil, add a handful of chopped parsley, some finely chopped rosemary and some minced lemon zest. Now add a couple of garlic cloves, minced, and season everything with coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper. Toss, then spread on a baking sheet.

Place the baking sheet in a 400-degree oven and roast the tomatoes until they are soft and aromatic. Now put the tomatoes under the broiler until they begin to char around the edges. Remove from the oven and set aside to cool. You can serve them like this--warm--or hold them a couple of days in the refrigerator while the flavors meld and reheat them.

We had them last night with pasture-raised pork chops from the farmers market down the street and a quinoa pilaf. My wife found some sour cherries in the fridge and made a reduction to sauce the pork. The sauce was delicious. But what really blew her hair back were the tomatoes. I don't know if I will ever get around to canning my tomatoes or making tomato sauce again now that I know the heights they can reach in the oven.

Enjoy your tomatoes. It's October. They won't be around much longer.

Alien Tomato

Ah, nature...

Kids Make Bread Crumb Pesto

Kids love to work with kitchen gadgets. They will fight for a turn on the salad spinner. They can hardly wait to get their hands on a vegetable peeler. Teaching my "food appreciation" classes at a private elementary school here in the District of Columbia, I've found that if you can put even the simplest kitchen tool in a child's hands, you have her complete attention.


There were even "ooohs" and "ahhhs" when I pulled out my mortar and pestle yesterday. "I remember when we used that last year!" Well, I guess we did use the mortar and pestle last year.

In my second lesson on seasonal fruits and vegetables, I wanted the kids to sample some extremely fresh, ripe heirloom tomatoes from the farmers market. And what better way to enjoy them than with some fresh mozzarella cheese and a pesto sauce made with basil picked from the garden (my garden, that is).


First, a matter of etymology. Anyone know where the word "pesto" comes from? In Italian, the verb pestare means "to crush" or "to step on." Hence the root of the word pestle, as in mortar and pestle. (This is how I work language into my cooking lessons. There are also plenty of opportunities for math, chemistry, biology...)


The classic pesto recipe calls for the inclusion of some kind of nut, such as pine nuts or walnuts. But there are such issues with nut allergies in a school setting that I've eliminated nuts of any kind from our lessons. I could not imagine what we might use as a substitute. Then it occurred to me that bread crumbs might approximate the crushed pine nuts. So I brought along a bag of fresh bread crumbs that I made ahead from a rustic loaf.


Before we begin the lesson, we usually sit in a circle in the multi-purpose room and chat. Cook anything good lately? I might ask. There was quite a lot to discuss about tomatoes, it turns out. Anyone care to guess where tomatoes come from? Most of the students guessed Italy or somewhere in Europe. In fact, not a single one had a clue that tomatoes have made a big round trip in our culinary tradition, originating in Central America and Mexico, traveling to Europe with the Spanish explorers and languishing for the longest time because people assumed they were poisonous, since tomatoes are a member of the deadly nightshade family.



Can you imagine spaghetti without tomato sauce?

Well, in fact, these kids can. They love pasta with cheese.

How about pizza without tomatoes?

Once again, they voted for pizza with cheese only, or "white" pizza.

How about gazpacho without tomatoes?

I think I had them there. Before tomatoes, gazpacho was about stale bread--the soup was made with bread and vinegar. Now people can hardly imagine it without tomatoes and tons of other vegetables.

Finally it's lesson time. After a good hand-washing, we meet at the demonstration table where I crack open a clove of garlic, smashing it on a cutting board with the palm of my hand. That always gets the kids' attention. We place the clove in the mortar with a big pinch of kosher salt to draw the juices out. Then everyone gets to come around the table and take a turn smashing the garlic with the pestle until what he have is a garlic paste.


Next I give each of the kids a stem off a basil plant so they can remove the leaves. We start adding leaves to the mortar, now with a dribble of extra-virgin olive oil. Again the kids take turns smashing and grinding. We add more leaves and continue working with the pestle.

At this point, my assistant, T., takes a chunk of Parmesan cheese and a grater to one end of the table and the kids take turns grating cheese. By they time they're finished with that, we've worked all of the basil leaves into our mix as well as a handful of bread crumbs. Toss in some cheese, some more olive oil. Soon we have a delicious looking pesto. The kids are anxious to try it.

They are a bit nonplussed by my selection of tomatoes. They don't know quite what to make of orange tomatoes, green striped tomatoes, tomatoes that are purple and almost black.

"Don't worry," I tell them. "They all taste like tomatoes. They're just different colors. Aren't they cool looking?"

"I don't think I want to eat the tomatoes. Can I go to the playground now?"

Nobody goes to the playground just yet. First we slice the tomatoes into wedges. They are extremely ripe and juicy. The aroma permeates the room. Then, while T. plates the tomatoes with the mozzarella cheese and the pesto, we retire to our spot in the multi-purpose room for a story.

I try to incorporated a picture-book story into all my cooking lessons. If I'm lucky at the library, the story links to the theme of whatever we are cooking. It's not always easy. Today I have a book called The Talking Vegetables, an African tale about a spider who's too lazy to help plant the village garden, but later wants to eat all the fresh vegetables. The vegetables chase the spider out of the garden and he has to settle for a dinner of plain rice.

By now, T. has assembled some gorgeous plates. There's plenty of observing and critiquing from the kids. Some pick up their plates for a closer inspection. They just pick at the tomatoes, or eat only the cheese, pushing the tomatoes and pesto off to the side. But most of the kids dig right in.

"It's spicy!" but in a good way, they say. A few ask for seconds. No, they beg for seconds. One little girl actually licks her plate clean.

Overall, I think tomatoes and pesto was a hit.

Beet, Red Onion & Tomato Salad

This is one of our favorite summer salads, all the better with beets and tomatoes freshly harvested from the garden.

The beets are the Chiogga variety, noteworthy for their concentric circles of red and gold when sliced open. We cook the beets in boiling water until just done, then move them to a cold water bath to arrest the cooking process. The tops and tails and the skin are all easily removed at that point. You can slice the beets into wedges, or very casually, however you prefer.

To make a dinner salad for two persons, slice 1/4 red onion very thinly and cut a ripe tomato into wedges. Add the beets and toss everything with extra-virgin olive oil and a splash of red wine vinegar. Season with course salt and pepper.

For a change, we added an herb, in this case several leaves of anise hyssop, chopped fine, plus some buds from the lavender-colored flowers that are now in bloom. You almost have to grow anise hyssop yourself--I've never seen it in the grocery--but it is a wonderful herb to have on hand, with its bright, almost sweet flavor of--as the name implies--anise.

You could also make this salad with a fine mustard vinaigrette. The vinaigrette would do well to bind all the flavors together and make an elegant presentation. Shallot could also substitute for the red onion and make for a more subtle flavoring. But for an easy everyday salad, we are happy with this very simple preparation, especially when the tomatoes are at their peak.

Yesterday's Breakfast

Sliced Brandywine tomatoes from the garden with pesto sauce and fresh mozzarella cheese.

Preparation time: About three minutes.

Shopping: none

Tomato production in the garden is in full force. What happens to all the tomatoes? Mostly, we just eat them. Fresh. Any way we can. It's almost an axiom of seasonal foods that when the food is in season, you just keep eating it until the season is over. I never get tired of juicy, ripe tomatoes. I can't imagine getting tired of tomatoes. And I don't cook with these tomatoes. They are too good. Any way sliced, sauced, seasoned with a little salt, a little extra-virgin olive oil, maybe a cheese of some kind and some basil leaf and you have a meal.

The pesto and the mozzarella cheese were already in the fridge, just waiting for some tomatoes to come along.

Tomatoes make a great sandwich, breakfast, lunch or dinner. And they are extremely good for you. Tomatoes are full of lycopenes, the agent that makes them red. Studies have shown that tomatoes, and the lycopenes they contain, help ward off a variety of cancers, especially lung and prostate cancer.

Lycopenes are best absorbed with a little fat, so don't be shy with the olive oil.

Above all, eat more tomatoes.