On My Plate: Tomatoes
It seems that everyone I know has been growing their own tomatoes at home.
“I didn’t expect to win (the recent Oxford Farmers Market salsa contest),” exclaimed Hailey. “It was the first time I ever made salsa.”
Hailey, assistant manager of the Oxford Farmers Market, was staffing the market table where more than a dozen different salsa samples, prepared by market vendors, awaited tasting and voting by shoppers.
“As long as I was staffing the table, I thought why not make salsa myself,” Hailey said.
Hailey is happy to share her recipe with farmers market shoppers. She used all local ingredients, of course, including tomatoes from Quail Ridge Farm, peppers from Stoney Hedgerow Farm, garlic from Miami’s research farm, peaches from Downing Fruit Farm and jalapenos from her own garden.
I asked Hailey why she thought her salsa received the most votes. She thought it was because her salsa had the most heat.
The Oxford Farmers Market is at its most colorful this time of year, as many varieties of tomatoes and peppers dominate the tables. In the winter, the predominant color is restrained green, whereas this time of year the tomatoes and peppers are bright red, yellow and purple.
Tomato recipes abound, including salsa, but in our household, tomatoes are consumed at lunch and dinner unadorned. Large tomatoes are sliced into wedges, and medium-sized ones are halved. The exception is that the tomatoes too mushy for slicing are placed in a pan and simmered to make a thick sauce.
It seems that everyone I know has been growing their own tomatoes at home. I admire their dedication and the immediacy of vine to table, but growing tomatoes is impractical outside our house, located in the woods with little direct sunlight. More importantly for us, we prefer to come home from the farmers market with a wide variety of tomatoes, rather than grow only one or two varieties at home.
A few years ago, I counted more than 70 varieties of tomatoes in the Oxford Farmers Market, but the count is lower now, probably in the thirties. Oxford Farmers Market growers tell me that shoppers “talk” heirloom varieties, but they actually buy familiar-looking hybrids. This year, for some reason, sales of cherry tomatoes are down.
For several years, I have kept careful notes with the names of the varieties obtained from each farmers market vendor. The idea has been to conduct a taste test and ranking at home. Candidly, it has been impossible to rank them, as they are all juicy and flavorful, especially when compared to supermarket and restaurant tomatoes that were grown several thousand miles from Oxford.
This year, I reverted to my usual practice of throwing the produce into my shopping bags randomly, unloading the jumble onto the kitchen counter and sorting them into suitable storage. From the kitchen counter, the tomatoes were sorted by size into four containers, occupying three one-quart containers and one large glass bowl.
The tomatoes in one of the bowls could be identified as queen of the night. These are dark-skinned heirloom varieties that measure around two inches in diameter and along the Rhine River in Germany. This variety is offered by Craig and Sharon Harkrider of Stoney Hedgerow Farm. I don’t know the names of the other varieties in the bowls, or which variety came from which local grower.
Salsa postscripts: Because Hailey is not a vendor, first place was awarded to Gerber Farms, and honorable mentions went to 7 Wonders Farm and Stoney Hedgerow Farm. Your columnist did not taste any of the salsa – candidly, not what I wanted to eat at 9 a.m.
