Too Many Tomatoes

Every summer, there are a couple of things that grow incredibly well, and produce like crazy. Early in the summer came the flood of beans; now I’m dealing with almost too many tomatoes. I’ve got every color and size, and I can’t remember a year when they came in so well, or produced so much. There have been so many, and I’ve been so busy, that I’ve had to find recipes that don’t require a lot of work to throw together. I’ve tried a few new recipes, including a pretty amazing one from Bon Appetit, (Maw Maw Hinson’s Tomato Gravy) , that just involves roughly chopped tomatoes, butter, and salt and pepper, and a couple of chutneys, including one from Jamie Oliver (Easy Tomato Chutney). I’ve also  been working on salsa, as the jalapeños and sweet peppers have ripened. Below are two recipes I’ve developed over the years. The measurements aren’ too fixed, and nor are the ingredients, but I like to try to keep it fairly simple. One is fresh, my version of Pico de Gallo, and the other is cooked.

Fresh Salsa

2-3 cups finely diced tomato (use whatever is ripest, various colors)
1/2-3/4 cup finely diced onion
1-2 jalapeños, seeded and finely diced
1/2 clove garlic, minced or pressed
1/3 cup chopped cilantro
1 tblsp vinegar, or juice of 1/2 lime
salt and white pepper

Combine all ingredients in bowl, mix to incorporate, serve as soon as possible. This recipe doesn’t keep well, so you should plan to use all of it fairly quickly. Serve with any kind of good tortilla chip.

Todd’s Garden Salsa

1 dozen large roma tomatoes
4-5 anaheim peppers
4-5 cloves minced garlic
2-3 jalapeños, diced
1 yellow onion, diced
olive oil
salt and pepper

For tomatoes: cut out stem end, slice in half lengthwise, and put in large bowl, add enough olive oil to coat well, add 1/2 minced garlic, liberally season with salt and pepper, and toss all to coat. On preheated, hot grill, place tomatoes facedown. Sear on cut side, and then turn on skin side. When the juice of the tomato starts to bubble around edges of skins, remove from grill into same bowl; the skins should come right off, or you can take them off when the tomatoes cool off. Once they are cooled off, roughly chop the tomatoes.

For peppers: put on hot, dry grill, and roast until the skin is blistered and browned, place in paper bag for 10-15 minutes, then peel, seed, and dice the peppers.

Meanwhile, saute onions, jalapeños, and garlic in olive oil in saucepan, cook until the onion is translucent (don’t brown), and add the tomatoes and peppers. Add salt and pepper, and bring to a simmer, and cook, stirring from time to time, until the tomatoes are reduced to about 2/3 the volume (10-20 minutes). Adjust seasonings. Serve with tortilla chips, or use on tacos, eggs, quesadillas–whatever you put salsa on. When I have a lot of good salsa (from the glut of tomatoes), I like to make the following recipe, which is an adaptation of an M.F.K. Fischer recipe (from The Art of Eating).

Eggs in Hell

6 eggs
4 cups of salsa
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 cup chopped green onion
salt and pepper

Bring salsa to a low simmer in large saucepan. Crack the eggs into a cup, one at a time, and add to salsa. If the salsa is thick, you can make depressions in the salsa with a spoon, so the eggs are immersed. Cover, and simmer on very low flame until the eggs are set, but still quite runny (the salsa will continue to cook the eggs). Sprinkle with the cheese, cover, and turn off heat. Once the cheese has melted, sprinkle with green onion, and serve with toast. This is a good brunch dish, and you could do this in the oven in a large casserole, doubling the recipe.