Tomatoes Tomatoes Tomatoes

Tomato season is like the Halloween of the harvest calendar, a time to gorge for what feels like a very short time. We are having a great tomato year here in New England, and it appears to be going strong for a few weeks yet.

Last week I was faced with a boatload of nature's candy from my CSA: ten pounds of heirlooms and three quarts of cherry tomatoes. Plus a few pounds of tomatillos (which aren't related to tomatoes but I put them in the same culinary bucket). I have lots of recipes I try to hit at least once a summer, like gazpacho, BLTs, tomato basil soup and tomato corn salad. But to mix things up, here's what I did last week. First I roasted some:

Then I made my favorite tomato sauce:

Then I brought a caprese salad to a barbecue:

And you know what? That took care of all my tomatoes and suddenly, I needed more. What I like about the roasted tomatoes and the sauce is that both can be frozen and brought out on a cold winter day. Like many good tomato dishes, you don't need a recipe for caprese, which is a mixture of tomatoes, basil and fresh mozzarella with some salt, pepper and good olive oil. But here are the other two recipes. Put them in a safe place, because come tomato time, you'll want to use them.

Roasted Tomatoes

Tomatoes, sliced about 1/4-1/2 inch thick
kosher salt
ground pepper
olive oil
thyme leaves (optional)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Lay tomato slices in a single layer on a baking sheet covered with parchment. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, oil and thyme. Roast in the oven until slightly browned and bubbly, about 40 minutes.

Roasted tomatoes can be frozen at this point, then used in soups and sauces. Or for a decadent appetizer you can bake a puff pastry sheet until golden, then top with a single layer of the roasted tomato slices. Add a dollop of mascarpone and a basil leaf on top of each tomato.

Tomato Butter Sauce
adapted from Marcella Hazan

2 pounds tomatoes, chunked
1 onion, peeled and cut in half
4 T. butter
kosher salt to taste
1/4 c. sliced basil leaves (optional)

In a sauce pan, place tomatoes, onion halves, and butter. Heat on medium heat until bubbling, then lower to a simmer and cook until onion is soft, about 45 minutes. Remove onion halves and discard. Puree sauce with an immersion blender. Add salt to taste and basil leaves.

The sauce can be easily doubled, and it can be frozen. Use on pasta, pizza or lasagna.

Summer Rolls for Summer Days

Near my house is a cafe that has seen several incarnations over the past fifteen years. The good, bad, and the indifferent have all existed in the space, which is on prime real estate in our commercial center and, amazingly, has parking. The most recent business to open there is Kickstand Cafe, and it seems that form and function have finally merged. The food and coffee are great and the atmosphere is lovely. I should know since I camped out there quite a bit while my house was under construction. 

One of the first things I tried at Kickstand was their summer rolls, and I was instantly hooked. Really hooked. And even though the rolls are inexpensive, the cost of eating them so often was mounting up. So while I'll never give up on Kickstand, I have started making summer rolls at home too. 

Summer rolls are delightfully easy to make, and (mostly) do not involve turning on any hot appliances during these hazy summer days. OK, I do roast tofu, but because that can be done ahead of time I pick the least hot moment to turn on the oven. Once all of the ingredients are in bowls, the assembly goes quickly.

One thing I try to mimic closely from Kickstand is their peanut dipping sauce. This sauce may, in fact, be the reason for my obsession with this dish. Without knowing Kickstand's ingredients, I bumbled along and created a reasonable approximation that is quite worthy of savoring all by itself on a spoon.

Summer Rolls with Peanut Dipping Sauce

makes 16 rolls

For the sauce:

1/3 c. smooth peanut butter

1/3 c. hoisin sauce

1/3 c. water, plus more if needed

the juice from one lime

kosher salt to taste

siracha or other hot sauce to taste

In a bowl, mix the peanut butter, hoisin, water, and lime juice until smooth. Add additional water to make the sauce pourable (but still thick). Add salt and hot sauce to taste. Set aside.

For the rolls:

1 14 oz. package firm tofu

cooking spray

kosher salt to taste

6 oz. thin rice noodles (also called mai fun or vermicelli)

2 carrots, grated fine

1 T. rice vinegar

5 pieces of romaine or leaf lettuce, sliced into 1/2 inch strips

1 cup mint leaves, packed

1 cup cilantro sprigs, packed

16 rice Spring Roll Skins (found at Whole Foods or Asian Markets)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Slice tofu into 1/2 inch slices and place on a baking sheet covered with parchment. Blot tofu dry with paper towels, then spray lightly with cooking spray and sprinkle with salt. Roast until tofu is lightly browned, about 30 minutes. Let cool (tofu can be refrigerated at this point for up to one week). 

Place rice noodles in a bowl. Pour boiling water over them and let sit until tender, 3-4 minutes. Drain and set aside. 

Toss grated carrots with rice vinegar in a bowl and set aside. Place lettuce, mint, and cilantro in separate bowls. Cut tofu into sticks. Line up the noodles, tofu, carrots, lettuce, and herbs around a cutting board. 

Place spring roll skins near the cutting board. Fill a pie plate or shallow bowl with lukewarm water and place next to skins. One at a time, submerge a spring roll skin into the water until softened, about 10-15 seconds. Remove skin and place on the cutting board. Add some of each of the ingredients to your liking in the middle of the skin. Fold the top over the ingredients, then the sides, then roll it towards you tightly to seal the roll. Place on a plate or a container lined with wax paper, taking care that the rolls don't touch each other. Repeat with remaining ingredients.

Serve with dipping sauce. 

Carbonara in a New Kitchen

We just wrote the last check for our kitchen renovation today. Today it's done. Frankly, we've been functioning in the space for a few weeks now, but today feels momentous. It's been quite the roller coaster ride to renovate a kitchen while continuing to live in the same house. Don't get me wrong, I am so grateful we have the opportunity to renovate the space. But I'm also happy to move onto the next phase. Here is a quick tour before things get too messy to snap photos.

We chose a galley layout, which in the end is one of the most efficient kitchen systems. There's no triangle that crosses the room; instead, everything flows along the line from refrigerator to sink to stove to dining room. It's been working great, and it's wide enough to accommodate more than one cook on each side. Along that line, we have a ridiculously powerful six burner stovetop. Which we will use a lot. I've already discovered it's so powerful some of my skillets can't handle the heat.

Off in a corner between the kitchen and living room we created a new desk area, with room for my embarrassing collection of cookbooks. This not only gives me a workspace close to the kitchen action, but it frees up our existing desk space for the ever increasing computer needs of my children. They get the desktop in the living room (with the screen facing me, thank you very much), and we put a new laptop in the kitchen desk area.

But beyond function, we had fun picking out some visual bling. We chose a gray glass subway tile for the backsplash. So inexpensive and so stunning. The woven pendants over the island are recycled telephone wires. Isn't that cool? And finally, a red barn door. Who cares if it's functional or not, it's just awesome.

 
Since we settled in a few weeks ago, we've been deciding where to put what and cooking as much as we can. We've baked pies, cooked zucchini fritters, and made popovers. All things we missed in our living room kitchen. But one simple pleasure that has come back to us is pasta. Pasta was surprisingly hard to pull off in the living room. For several weeks we did our dishes in the basement, and it just didn't seem worth the effort to go down a flight of stairs to drain the pasta water. So the other night we made carbonara, a delightful yet easy dish. Sometimes it's the simple things that are missed most of all.

Pasta Carbonara

1 lb pasta
4-6 pieces of bacon
1/2 small onion, diced small
1 c. peas (thawed if frozen)
3 eggs
3/4 c. parmesan cheese, grated
1/2-1 c. pasta water
kosher salt and pepper to taste
Flat leaf parsley, chopped
More grated parmesan for topping at the table

In a skillet, cook bacon until crispy. Remove and drain on a paper towel. When cool, crumble bacon into small pieces. Cook onion in the bacon fat on medium heat until softened, about 8-10 minutes. Remove onions with a slotted spoon and set aside with the bacon.

Cook pasta in a large pot of boiling, well-salted water. While the pasta is cooking, in a large serving bowl, mix together the eggs and parmesan with a whisk until blended. Just before draining the pasta, scoop out 1 cup of pasta water and set aside.

Drain the pasta, and while it's still hot, add to the serving dish. Working quickly with tongs, mix pasta  and 1/2 cup of the pasta water thoroughly with the egg mixture (this allows the egg mixture to cook and evenly coat the pasta). Add bacon, onion, and peas and mix well. Add a bit more pasta water if it seems that the pasta is sticky.

Place pasta in a bowl, top with parsley, and eat immediately.