YOU SAY TOMATO, I SAY TOMATO!0

By Stockton Briggle

Who cares how you pronounce it, tomatoes are one of summer’s greatest treasures!
Gorgeous heirloom tomatoes fill the markets and for a few short months you can savor one of nature’s prime pleasures.

When I was a kid, my grandmother had a huge garden where she grew lettuce, cucumbers, zucchini. My most fun days were the ones we spent building the trellis’ for the tomatoes. I couldn’t wait for them to grow and shed their delicious fruit. Yes, in case you didn’t know, tomatoes are technically a fruit and not a vegetable.

Anyway, there would come the day that they were ripe to pick and my brother and I would grab them off of the vine and eat them right then and there. The juices would run down our faces and stain our clothes, but who cared! To this day, a homegrown beefsteak tomato instantly brings back treasured memories of being a kid.

These memories are all the more poignant due to the food industries proclivities to produce bigger genetically engineered tasteless red tomatoes. How sad that many people today don’t even know what a real homegrown unadulterated tomato tastes like.

Fortunately, with the amazing growth of local farmer’s markets, you have a shot at the real deal. Now is when tomatoes are at their peak and will stay that way for most of the summer. Orange, green, purple, yellow and red, large, small or even the cherry tomatoes beckon you with their taste delights. Buy organic and buy from reputable sources that feature local farmers. It is not that difficult.

Here are a couple of tomato recipes that I think you might enjoy. Give them a try.

CHERRY TOMATO AND YELLOW SQUASH CRUMBLE.
This dish is the essence of summer!

3Tbs. butter or margarine
11/4 cups fresh breadcrumbs
2 Tbs. finely chopped parsley
1 small yellow onion chopped (I cup)
½ lb. small yellow crooked neck squash, diced (2 cups)
3 cups cherry tomatoes
1 clove garlic, minced
½ cup grated Swiss or Gruyere cheese

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Spray 9-inch square baking dish with cooking spray.
• Heat butter in skillet over medium heat until melted. Pour 2 Tbs. over breadcrumbs in bowl. Stir in parsley.
• Return skillet to burner, and increase heat to medium-high. Add onion and cook for 7 to 9 minutes, or until beginning to brown. Stir in squash and cook 4 minutes. Add tomatoes and garlic, and cook 2 minutes more, or until tomatoes are warmed through. Season with salt, if desired. Transfer mixture to prepared baking dish. Sprinkle cheese on top. Spread breadcrumb mixture over cheese.
• Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until golden and bubbling. Serve hot.

PICKLED CHERRY TOMATOES
Makes 3 cups

1 cup white balsamic vinegar
4 tsp. sugar
2 tsp. salt
2 chilies de arbol, crumbled
2 whole allspice
1/4 tsp. cayenne pepper
1 clove garlic, peeled and smashed
1 bay leaf
3 ups cherry tomatoes, halved
4 thyme sprigs
¾ cups water

• Bring vinegar, ¾ cup water, sugar, salt, chilies, and cayenne to a simmer in sauce -pan. Stir to dissolve sugar then remove from heat. Cool 30 minutes.
• Put garlic and bay leaf in bottom of 1- quart glass jar. Add tomatoes, and tuck thyme sprigs along sides.
• Pour vinegar mixture over tomatoes, and marinate 1 hour. Store up to 1 day in refrigerator.