Summertime is Tomato Time
Had the privilege of enjoying ripe local tomatoes twice this past weekend, first at Chanterelle, where I had lunch with two friends on Saturday, and again last night at Dressler in Williamsburg, where giant tomato disks are stacked together with hunks of watermelon, a summer perennial that’s getting a lot of play these days on both restaurant menus and on the glossy pages of fancy food magazines.
The appearance of tomatoes in local markets (and of corn and peaches) defines late summer for a lot of folks like me, and like with every seasonal bounty, there is always a quest to see how many different ways we can use them at home.
I recently came across a lovely vehicle for this squirt-in-the-mouth summer bounty. You might recall that I was a beneficiary of Lisa Leonard-Lee’s dynamite lamb tagine last winter. When, a day or two later I asked her for the recipe, she cooked it again (!) to test the recipe and then took pictures of her finished product).
Well, Lisa Leonard-Lee happens to have a blog called Miel et Sel (Honey and Salt, a name I love), and her most recent post is a recipe for Salmorejo, an Andalusian tomato and bread soup (closely related to Gazpacho) that can be eaten chilled as a mid-day pick-me-up or, if you want to make a meal of it, can be enjoyed with any number of accent accompaniments. Lisa includes recipes for four of these as well.
Trust me, she’s as serious about her recipe testing as she is meticulous in her food-styling, a one-woman food magazine. Check it!
Gazpacho/Salmorejo wine pairing: The classic wine pairing for this fragrant summer treat is, of course, fino sherry (or more specifically, a manzanilla), but this kind of dish works great with table wines as well, white or rose. Good acidity is key and aromatic is ok, just so long as it doesn’t compete with the tomatoes’ own subtle perfume.
Albariño from Rías Baixas, Chablis, Savennieres, and white Rioja fermented in stainless steel: Montecillo, Marques de Caceres, CVNE Monopole. For rose, choose a more austere, less fruity style, like Muga’s clarete-style rose, a summer standard often found in my icebox.*
*”Icebox” is, of course, an antiquated and not very accurate term to describe my GE refrigerator, but I like the way it sounds in this context; in fact I like the way “icebox” sounds in any context. It’s just fun to say, period. I wish we used it more often. And of course it conjures William Carlos Williams’ famous poem, “This is just to say“:
I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the iceboxand which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast.Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold.