The credenza at Cositutti is filled with the last tomatoes of the summer. Soon the opportunities for enjoying the vibrant fresh flavor of homegrown tomatoes will be over. Even though scientists at Cornell University claim to have discovered a gene that controls the ripening of tomatoes, a tasty store bought tomato is hard to find. In a few weeks we'll have to settle for the mealy,mushy texture of something in the produce section of the grocery store that once resembled a tomato or succumb to buying those cute, little Southeast Asian grape tomatoes. Sweet and flavorful yes but it takes about 20+ grape tomatoes to make one old fashioned regular sized tomato. Yet with names like "Elfin","Jelly Bean" "Cherub" and "Christmas Grapes" who can resist them. They are sweet, can be grown year around and used in most recipes that call for regular sized tomatoes. So I got to thinking about what an Italian would do with a tomato to best take advantage of the FINAL DAYS of my tomato harvest. |
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What would an Italian do with a tomato? Un scherzo: Throw it at a bad opera singer at La Scala?
Italians would never be that rude at the opera or that wasteful.
They knew the tomato was special as early as 1544 when Pietro Andrea Mattioli an Italian physician and botanist from the University of Padua included the tomato in his Discourse on Material Medicine where he discussed the tonic and magical powers of the pomo d'oro or "golden apple". However it wasn't until 1839 that the tomato met pasta in Italy when the Duke of Buonvicino offered a recipe for vermicelli co le pomodoro made with crushed tomatoes and the leftovers of onions and herbs from the garden, lightly fried in oil creating the first tomato sauce.
Speaking of leftovers, one of Italy's favorite ways to use fresh tomatoes is in the making of panzanella, a salad that uses day old Tuscan bread and Tuscan Extra Virgin Olive Oil.
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Seeing and Savoring Italy
