Fried Green Tomatoes and Basil-ly Red Tomato Sauce

In about a week or two, worried for the approaching frost, a lot of farmers are going to start selling you something you wouldn't normally buy (except for that really cute movie)--green tomatoes. We have 'em in our garden, and once they get frost-bite and turn brown and rot, we won't be able to do anything with them, either. When trimming back the tomato plants, I salvaged these green guys so Keegan could make Fried Green Tomatoes. This is basically what he did:


Fried Green Tomatoes in Cornmeal Flour

Slice green tomatoes about 1/4" thick
Warm up a pan with 1 1/2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Wisk 1-2 eggs in a bowl.
Put about 1 cup cornmeal in a bowl (we used blue cornflour).
Dip green tomato slices in egg mixture, then coat with cornmeal flour.
Fry both sides until crispy and brown.

When frying stuff, it's important to keep the oil clean. If you notice bits of flour are floating off and the tomatoes are soaking up more grease than goodness, just let the pan cool, wipe it out, and start again.

We ate these with a tomato sauce Manissa made. Everyone has their own method with tomato sauce--she says the trick is to squeeze the seeds and water out of the tomatoes before slicing them. Then (like applesauce), you just put the chopped parts in a pot with olive oil, add some onions (saute them in a pan a bit first), eggplant--whatever else you like in your sauce (zucchini, etc.) and a whole lot of minced garlic. Let it cook down (about 30-40 minutes), and then in the last 5 minutes add a ton of basil. You can see how big our pile was!













Look at this plate of food! Kimchi, eggplant dip, stuffed cabbage, tomato sauce with basil, fried green tomatoes, and good lord, breaded salmon (Alaska woo!). This magnificent party on a plate was followed by homemade, locally-grown peach sorbet.