Mulberry Jam

[This post was previously published in The Washington Examiner newspaper, April 6, 2005]

During the early years of my marriage, as my husband and I adapted to cooking and living together, we learned to share a tight kitchen space and limited list of equipment. The one item he would never touch, however, was my beloved cast iron frying pan, purchased at a hardware store in my days as a poor student. “You have a relationship with that pan, and I don’t want to come between you,” was his comment. Since then I’ve added many fine pots and pans to my batterie de cuisine, some of them fairly expensive. Yet all of them remain mere equipment, without the emotional aura of that beat-up, homely, black skillet. These days every retail outlet from Williams Sonoma to QVC sets great store by an upscale collection of brands: All-Clad, Calphalon, and Le Creuset among them. All of them make very fine pots and pans. But I’d like to put in a word for the kind of humble cookware that’s still made in much the same way it was in the 19th century.

Plain cast iron is unsurpassed for even heat retention and cooking without hot spots. When properly seasoned, it develops a non-stick surface rivaling that of Teflon while retaining the ability to get hot enough for proper browning (unlike Teflon). It heats up slowly compared with aluminum, copper or steel, but then gives that heat back evenly and at as high a temperature as you need for searing or frying. That means that you can sear a steak without burning it, cook perfect sunny-side-up eggs, bake a light crispy cornbread right in the skillet, or get your breaded catfish filets done to the ideal golden brown.

I admit that my pan is not perfect. Cast iron isn’t good for sauces or for acidic foods like tomatoes. It can rust if not cared for properly, and it is not for the fastidious cook: over-scrubbing can damage the non-stick properties of the surface. It’s really best if you can relax enough to overlook a bit of oil or grease left in the pan, which will keep it from rusting as well as preserving the silky surface you may have worked hard to achieve. That’s not to say you can’t clean it out; just that you want to stick to a swab with pure hot water and a soft nylon brush. No SOS pads or detergent, please!

It used to be that cooks guarded their cast iron cookware jealously, for the best seasoning could take many repeated uses to achieve, with frustrating results during the breaking-in period. One of my aunts still tells the story of how her teenaged son, asked to help with the washing up, diligently scoured her iron griddle clean of twenty years’ worth of seasoning. Thankfully, cooks no longer have to invest years to achieve good results. Now you can buy cast iron cookware pre-seasoned at the factory, and enjoy instantly the wonderful properties that used to take months or even years to fully develop. Try it, and you too might find yourself developing a sneaking affection for a homely (but oh, so effective) skillet.

This is one of my favorite winter chicken dishes. When it’s cold and damp outside, I crave big-flavored sauces and stews. This dish is basically a chicken cacciatore with many adaptations to make the sauce even richer and more flavorful. While the list of ingredients may sound like a jumble of strong flavors, they mellow when cooked slowly into a wonderful blended sauce that I could happily eat all by itself. This is excellent served with plain couscous to soak up the extra “goosh”.

Note: Vietnamese fish sauce, or Nuo’c Mam, is an anchovy-flavored liquid used constantly in Vietnamese cooking. It is a very important ingredient to this dish. After slow cooking, you won’t taste the flavor of fish at all, yet the fish sauce brings out a dark richness to the tomatoes that I haven’t recaptured in any other way. Many Asian groceries carry it; my current favorite is the One Crab brand, which is among the milder versions of this sauce. If you can’t find Nuo’c Mam but want to try to achieve a similar flavor, you might try using 1 to 2 teaspoons of Worcestershire Sauce, which also contains anchovies.

Sicilian-Style Chicken Cacciatore

3 lb. chicken pieces washed and patted dry, with skins
3-4 T. olive oil
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
1 handful dark raisins
1/4 cup pine nuts (optional)
1/2 cup pitted black olives (kalamata are good; supermarket canned black olives are too salty and bland)
1 28 oz. can plum tomatoes, chopped with juice
2 T. Vietnamese fish sauce
2 T. capers, drained (optional)

In a large deep saucepan, heat olive oil over medium-high heat, then brown chicken pieces on both sides until golden brown. Remove to a plate. Add onion slices to pan and cook until they turn golden and begin to acquire brown edges. Return the chicken to the pan with garlic slices, raisins and pine nuts (if using) and fry for another minute or two.

Add remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. Turn heat to medium-low and simmer with lid ajar for about 40 minutes, stirring occasionally. Alternatively, cover tightly and cook in a preheated 350-degree oven for 40 minutes. Chicken should be extremely tender and sauce will thicken somewhat. If you wish to thicken the sauce right before serving, remove chicken pieces to a plate or bowl and boil sauce hard for a few minutes to thicken. Then pour sauce over chicken to serve.

I finally pulled my tomato vines out of the garden last week even though we haven’t yet had a killing frost here in Falls Church. After a whole summer of vigorous fruiting, the vines were tired and shagged out, and the tomatoes have a very hard time ripening in the short days of fall. Mostly they just sit there on the vine and eventually fall off without ever achieving ripeness.

But there were still lots of nice-looking green tomatoes on the plants before I uprooted them. I hated to waste them, so I picked every one that was larger than racquet ball size and carried them indoors. Are you aware that fried green tomatoes are not just a hokey movie title but a downright tasty dish? If you fix them right, they even taste, dare I say it, sophisticated. Right now is the perfect time to prepare green tomatoes. In the early summer I’m so hungry for ripe tomatoes I wouldn’t even consider sacrificing any of my crop to eat green. In late fall when the fruits don’t ripen properly anyway, it’s just the ticket.

Fried Green Tomatoes with Goat Cheese

I like this dish as an appetizer. Serve it with an herbal-tasting white wine like a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc and its soul-food roots are transmogrified into something almost sublime. I don’t recommend non-stick pans for frying the tomatoes since they don’t get hot enough to brown the coating before the tomatoes start to fall apart. Cast iron is perfect, otherwise use any pan that will heat evenly and at a high enough temperature. Note: if you don’t have or don’t like goat cheese, this is also very good with a mild feta cheese.

4-5 full-sized green tomatoes
1/2 cup fine yellow corn meal
1 egg, lightly beaten
salt and pepper to taste
peanut oil
1/3 cup goat cheese, warmed to room temperature

Season the fine corn meal with salt and pepper and spread out on a plate or dish. Slice the tomatoes into quarter-inch thick rounds. Spray your pan with Pam or another non-stick coating and heat over medium high heat. Pour oil into the pan until it is about one quarter inch deep.

When the oil is hot, dip a slice of tomato into the egg to coat it, and quickly dip in the cornmeal mixture until evenly coated with the meal. Lay gently in the pan, which should sizzle. Continue to dip and coat slices until the pan is full without being crowded. Cook slices until golden brown on bottom, then gently turn to completely brown on both sides (about three minutes per side). Remove cooked slices to a plate lined with paper towels and then transfer to a warm plate. Use two forks to put a dollop of the warmed goat cheese on top of each slice and eat immediately.

This soup relies on sweet yellow peppers as the starring ingredient. Every time I see them for a decent price, I get the yen to make this soup. Although for most of the year sweet bell peppers are outrageously priced, they are often more reasonable in the fall months. I’ve noticed brightly colored yellow, orange and red peppers at the groceries lately for under $2 per pound, which is a relative bargain.

Not only is this soup beautiful in the bowl, but it has a wonderful fresh flavor and more delicacy than many bean-based soups. I found a version of this recipe years ago in an issue of Prevention Magazine and have altered it over the years to suit myself. It could be made with sweet red or orange peppers, although it might lose a bit of its esthetically colorful appeal. It would not work well with green bell peppers, because of their bitter qualities.

Yellow Pepper and White Bean Soup

3 T. olive oil
3 yellow bell peppers, ½” to 1” dice
1 medium onion, chopped
4 large garlic cloves, minced
1 28 oz. can Italian tomatoes, coarsely chopped with liquid
1 quart chicken stock (use low-sodium if using canned)
2 15 oz. cans canellini beans (Goya brand are good)
8 fresh sage leaves
3 t. salt or to taste
½ t. sugar
½ c. heavy cream
2 t. balsamic vinegar

In a large soup pot or dutch oven, combine oil, peppers, onion and garlic. Cook over low heat, covered, until vegetables are soft but not browned (10 to 15 minutes).

Add tomatoes with juice, chicken stock, sage, salt, sugar and beans. Simmer until soup begins to thicken, beans are soft, and color blends to a rosy orange.

Off heat, stir in cream and vinegar. Season with freshly ground black pepper to taste. Heat over low heat and serve immediately. Do not boil after the cream is added or the cream will break, or curdle. This doesn’t affect flavor of the soup, but it does detract from its appearance.

This is the cookie recipe that I make so often my family calls them simply “Sue’s Cookies”. I’ve been making them ever since I learned to bake. The origin of this recipe is somewhat fogged by the mists of time, but my recollection is that when I was first beginning to learn my way around a kitchen at the age of eleven or so, I found this recipe in the back of a book of paper dolls. Something about the list of ingredients appealed, and I asked my mother for help making them. The rest is history.

These are simplicity itself as far as ingredients go. There are no nuts, no chocolate chips, no jimmies. Two things make them wonderful: the heavenly smell of the spices and molasses while they bake, and the fact that they remain moist and chewy after baking. The only tricky thing about them is timing. They need to be watched closely while baking in order to get that special chewy texture. If your oven door has a window, take them out after the rounded tops show cracks, but before they begin to deflate and flatten down. Take them out too quickly and they’ll be underdone in the centers (yuck). Leave them in too long and they lose the glorious soft bite. When overcooked they become more like typical crispy gingersnaps—nice, but not so special.

Molasses Ginger Cookies

¾ c. vegetable oil
¼ c. light unsulfured molasses
1 c. sugar
1 egg
½ t. ground cloves
½ t. ginger
1 tsp. cinnamon
½ t. salt
2 c. all-purpose flour
2 t. baking soda
extra sugar for rolling

Beat the first four ingredients together. Stir in the salt and spices, then add flour and baking soda. I usually sift the baking soda to remove any lumps. Chill in the refrigerator for about an hour to make the dough easier to work with.

After chilling the dough, preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Take the dough and roll into a series of one-inch balls. Dip the balls in granulated sugar until they are covered, then place on a greased cookie sheet. Bake for 9 to 10 minutes (watching closely). Let cookies cool on the baking sheet for three to five minutes, then remove gently to a wire rack until completely cool. Store in an airtight container. Makes about 40 cookies.

When I was in college, my friends and I termed anything reminiscent of hippie culture “crunchy granola”. Organic food, bare feet, long hair and long skirts, you know the kind of thing I mean. Stuff that would be natural to people who probably make their own granola.

Well look what happened to me. I actually became the kind of person who makes her own granola. Never thought that would happen, but you know what? Granola you buy at the store is expensive! When I got to like the stuff and started regularly shelling out $4.00 for a little tiny bag, I knew there had to be a better way. After all, the main ingredient of most granola is oats, and oats are cheap, so why does a storebought mixture have to be so costly?

So several years ago I started to experiment. I checked out more than a dozen recipes for various types of granola and started tinkering with ingredients and proportions until I came up with one I could eat nearly every morning. I like it on yogurt with fruit and honey. My mother has gotten addicted to topping her breakfast cereal with it for a bit of extra crunch. It’s also delicious on ice cream.

The hardest part of making granola may be finding the ingredients. I often buy ingredients at a country store that caters to Amish customers, but you may also find everything you need at health food stores or even from baking catalogues. Feel free to substitute– there’s nothing magic about these ingredients or proportions and if you find you really prefer a different kind of nut or a different ratio of grain flakes, then go for it.

Maple Almond Granola

2 c. old-fashioned rolled oats
1 c. sliced almonds
1/2 c. wheat flakes
1/2 c. rye or barley flakes
1/2 c. flaked coconut
1/3 c. raw shelled sunflower seeds
1/4 c. wheat germ
1/2 t. salt

1/3 c. canola oil
3/8 c. maple syrup (Grade B is fine)
1/4 c. honey
1/2 t. almond extract
1 t. vanilla

Heat oven to 325 degrees and prepare an 8×14″ baking pan by lining it with baking parchment to keep the granola from sticking to the pan.

Combine all dry ingredients in a large bowl and stir to mix. In a small saucepan, heat the liquid ingredients over low heat just until they are free-flowing (they don’t need to be really hot). Stir into dry ingredients and transfer to the prepared baking pan. Bake for 20 minutes. After the first 20 minutes take the pan from the oven and stir, watching corners carefully to make sure they don’t overbrown, and put back in for another 20 minutes. Stir again, and bake for a final 10 minutes or until uniformly golden brown.

At last the cooler weather of fall has returned and I feel called to my stove once again. For the past four months I’ve barely done any baking and precious little of the kind of slow-cooked dinners that my husband enjoys. Instead we’ve had lots of quick pasta dishes, salads of many kinds, and pan-sautéed items that don’t heat up the kitchen very much.

Now I’m eager to dive back into breads and pizzas, roasts and casseroles. To kick off the season, we had one of our favorite cool-weather breakfasts on Saturday, when I baked a German Apple Pancake for the first time since early last spring. This dish is easy and fairly impressive since it puffs up like a soufflé. Just make sure to have everyone seated at the table when it comes out of the oven. It’s especially good served with something savory on the side, like bacon or a mild sausage.

German Apple Pancake

1 apple, cored and sliced with skins left on
(Golden Delicious, Jonathan, and Fuji are good)
1 T. sugar
1 T. butter
¼ t. cinnamon

2 eggs
1 c. flour
¼ t. salt
1 c. milk
2 T. butter for pan
powdered sugar for garnish

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. In a small saucepan, melt one tablespoon of butter over moderate heat, and when the foam subsides add the sliced apples. Sprinkle with 1T. granulated sugar and the cinnamon. After about four minutes, stir and flip the apple slices. Once the sugar has caramelized and the apples begin to get soft, set the pan aside, off the heat.

In a medium bowl, beat two eggs together with the milk. Sift flour and salt together and stir into the egg mixture. Beat together just until smooth.

Meanwhile, add the remaining two tablespoons of butter to a well-seasoned cast-iron pan and place in the 400-degree oven until melted. Swish the melted butter about in the pan to evenly coat bottom and sides, then pour the cold batter into the pan. Top with the apple-sugar mixture, arranging the slices attractively on top the batter.

Place the pan in the oven and bake for 25 to 30 minutes. The batter will puff up expansively, like a popover. Once the pancake is golden brown and well-puffed, remove the pan and garnish with a good sprinkling of powdered sugar. Serve immediately.

Last week my husband and I were traveling in the Finger Lakes region of western New York State. I used to live in the area some seventeen years ago, when I was a graduate student in Ithaca. At that time most New York wines were pretty bad. There were a few exceptions, but on the whole wines from the area were cheap, sweet and simple. Wine cooler fodder, if you remember that mercifully brief fad.

Well times have changed, baby. Throughout a single day of tasting I kept having a strong feeling of dislocation. “Wait a minute—is this Napa Valley?” The wines were delicious, with absolutely nothing to apologize for. The tasting rooms were lovely, making the most of the glorious scenery. The winery staff people doing the pouring were proud of their product and good ambassadors for the region. I can’t wait to go back and continue my explorations of the many small producers that are making a name for themselves.

Our first visit of the day was to the Dr. Konstantin Frank vineyard, named for its founder, on the shores of Keuka Lake. Dr. Frank, a Ukrainian immigrant, was an early booster of the region and a pioneer in cultivating the European vinifera grape. Before his experiments in the sixties, the region was known only for its American grapes, like Concord and Delaware. While these grapes are fine for juice, they make terrible wine. Dr. Frank was convinced that he could grow the fine winemaking varieties even in a climate as challenging as that of upstate New York. Together with other pioneers at Cornell University and the Gold Seal Winery, he proved it could be done and made possible the growth of a new wine-producing region.

My husband and I had resolved we would only buy wines that were special in some way. By that we meant no wines that could be produced better elsewhere. I didn’t want wine that was pretty good for a New York wine, but wine that was worth drinking no matter where it was from. I thought that would be a pretty tough standard based on my past experience with the region, but instead we found ourselves struggling to narrow down the list as the tasting progressed and we grew more and more impressed. We know before we went that the Dr. Frank cellars are renowned for their German-style Rieslings. But when we found ourselves exclaiming over a subtle and delicate Pinot Noir, we knew we weren’t in Kansas anymore. Delicious red wine from a New York grower? Impossible!

After much debate, we came out with two cases. One full case was a non-vintage white blend under the Salmon Run label, which the Dr. Frank company creates using other growers’ wines. This Cold Brook White was a pleasant, off-dry blend of chardonnay and Riesling with a slight flinty undertaste I particularly associate with New York. I don’t think you’d mistake it for the product of anywhere else, which meant it fit our requirements. I look forward to pairing it with a wide range of food, and at $7 per bottle it will make a great every day table wine. The second case was a mixture of more refined wines under the Dr. Konstantin Frank label. We came home with the Dr. Frank Dry Riesling (2004), the Johannisberg Riesling (2004) and the Pinot Noir (2001). The Dry Riesling is a multiple-award winner, and it fully lived up to billing. Very dry, with little residual sweetness, it still had lots of fruit taste and a very winning delicacy. The Johannisberg Riesling I liked even better, which surprised me because I don’t usually care for semi-dry wines. This, though, had a roundness and a balance that was simply delicious. I can’t wait to pair this somewhat flowery wine with a simple meal of roast chicken.

The big surprise, as I’ve mentioned, was the 2001 Pinot Noir. At more than $21 per bottle, we felt we were paying a bit of a “pinot premium” (thank you “Sideways” for ruining pinot prices for next three years). Nevertheless, the medium body, berry fruitiness and clean finish made me think this will go beautifully with duck or a mild lamb. I wouldn’t bet on New York being able to produce a red this good in every year, but that vintage impressed the heck out of me.

A mere mile and a half down the road towards the small town of Hammondsport is the equally well-known Heron Hill winery. Heron Hill grows much the same variety of grapes as Dr. Frank on the same slopes by the lake, but the effect in the bottle couldn’t be more different. Here the standout was a Chardonnay. We’d tasted two Chardonnays at Dr. Frank and felt they were fine, but nothing special. Heron Hill’s Ingle Vineyard Chardonnay (2002) was fantastic, in contrast. Aged in European oak, the wine had vanilla warmth mellowed by a moderate buttery smoothness without being in the least bit gooey. We thought it was well worth the $15 price point. Our other favorite was the Riesling Reserve 25th Anniversary Vintage (2002). Bone dry and unbelievably delicate, I’d be very careful pairing this wine with any kind of food. It has a delicious austerity that could easily be overwhelmed. I plan to serve it as an aperitif, and only with my favorite fellow wine snobs. The rest of our case was filled out by a blend we were quite taken with, the Eclipse White 2003. Mostly Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc, the wine has 15% Pinot Gris. Yet the Pinot Gris is at the forefront of the taste, making the wine taste like an excellent Italian Pinot Grigio, without a trace of the harshness that sometimes mars that style of wine. This wine will be terrific with light pasta dishes and white-fleshed fish.

By this time we had tasted and discussed a total of eighteen wines at the two wineries. Making our selections for the case we purchased took extensive and very pleasurable debate. Once we’d loaded the back of the car with our booty from Heron Hill, joining the two cases already there from Dr. Frank’s, we were done for the day. On to Hammondsport for a leisurely lunch at a sidewalk table beside the town green, and then a scenic drive back to our bed and breakfast.

I can’t wait to go back to the region to visit the many well-respected wineries we weren’t able to see this time: Fox Run, Hermann Wiemer, Wagner (famous for its Ice Wine), Chateau Lafayette-Reneau and a few others. Next time I’ll allow at least four days for roaming and tasting. And now to plan the dinner party!

It seems almost every cultural phenomenon inspires a reaction against it. Now that so many of us get a majority of our calories from fast food or from venti frappucinos slurped in our cars, I’m reading more and more pleas for people to get back in touch with where their food comes from. Often this comes with a suggestion to support your local farmers market, or to try growing a few of your own vegetables. Earlier this summer I visited friends who are taking that idea a step further and raising their own chickens for eggs.

My friends the Barchets live on about ten acres just outside of Downingtown, Pennsylvania. Ron is a brewer, the CEO of Victory Brewing Company in Downingtown. His wife, Linda, is a vet. I can’t imagine two people better suited to use and enjoy a small country plot with the accompanying historic farm house. Their four children enjoy what seems an idyllic life with plenty of space to roam, a pond with a small boat for messing around in, and great sledding hills to use when it snows.

I knew before we went to see them that the family had acquired a few chickens since our last visit. I didn’t realize they’d gone into poultry in a pretty big way. As soon as Mark and I were out of the car, we were personally introduced to a total of about 20 chickens, plus several ducks and an imposing pair of Brown China geese.

"Do the birds ever supply chicken dinners?" I asked.

"Oh, no," Linda answered with a laugh. "These are pets!"

Each bird had a name and a well-understood personality. I was charmed to see how tame they were, following the kids around and submitting to being picked up and carried around without much fuss. As we sat talking on a low stone wall, the geese came over and plucked at our shirts, honking as if to join the conversation.

The next day we were sent home with a dozen carefully selected eggs. The eggs were very large with shells in many colors. Some were ivory white, others a soft creamy tan, and there was a range of soft blue and green shades from the Araucanas in the flock. Inside, the yolks were such a dark golden yellow they were almost orange, which made for spectacular scrambled eggs and omelettes. The flavor was rich, everything an egg should be (and so rarely is). When I had to go back to using mass-produced eggs after going through the whole dozen, it took me days to get reaccustomed to the pallid, thin-textured eggs from the grocery store.

Not only were they delicious, they were probably better for us than the factory eggs. I’ve read about analyses that show free-range eggs are lower in cholesterol and higher in healthful omega-3 fatty acids than ordinary mass-produced eggs. (See this story on the website for Organic Style.)

I found the visit inspiring. If I ever have the space, I’m going to think seriously about starting a small flock of my own. In the meantime, I’ve started spending more for the free-range eggs I can buy at my local farmers market. If more people have a chance to taste the difference, I think we might see a new trend towards "artisanal eggs", like we now see increased popularity for small wineries, breweries, and artisanal cheeses. I’m in favor of anything that encourages people to enjoy their taste buds and support local producers.

And Linda– thanks friend, they were the best eggs I ever ate!

One of the advantages of living in the suburbs is that I finally have enough space for a small vegetable garden. Back when I was living in D.C., I had only a tiny postage stamp in front of my townhouse, and considered myself lucky to have that. Now I have a space ten by twenty feet that’s devoted to a rotating assortment of carefully chosen vegetables. While that plot is ample compared to my townhouse space, it’s still pretty small for a vegetable garden, so I have to be judicious. I only have room to plant things that I think are really worth the space and the effort of caring for them. I experiment with a few new things every year, but I’ve also settled on a few must-haves after ten years of trial: salad greens and peas in spring, radishes and carrots, at least one plant of summer squash, and always, heirloom tomatoes.

The tomatoes are in full-production mode right now, which means even with only four plants I can barely keep up with the supply. My friends and neighbors are the happy beneficiaries of the overage, and Mark and I are enjoying tomatoes with everything. Last night’s menu was Silver Queen sweet corn on the cob, roast free-range chicken and sliced tomatoes with olive oil drizzled over them. Summer ambrosia.

"Heirloom" is a term that gets thrown around a lot these days. My understanding is that originally some varieties were called heirloom because they pre-dated the more recent hybrid varieties and were saved as seeds by generations of farmers. Now the term seems to mean something like "fancy", especially on restaurant menus. For gardeners I guess it means something other than the tomato types commonly sold by big companies like Burpee. My favorite heirloom tomatoes all tend to have a few things in common: They’re indeterminate, meaning the vines just keep growing all season. They have tender textures that make them too delicate to ship long distances. And they have fantastic, juicy, tomato-y flavor that no cellophane-wrapped tomato ever approached in its wildest dreams.

Whatever their provenance, I enjoy them because planting three or four kinds of heirloom varieties will give me a tremendous range in tastes, textures and colors. This year I have:

• Cherokee Purple, a dark purplish-red beefsteak with fruits as large as small grapefruits but a wonderful texture
• Lady Luck, a pinkish-red round tomato with great acidic flavor
• Champion, a very traditional red beefsteak that fruits early but has better flavor than the better-known Early Girl variety
• Lemon Boy, a yellow slicing tomato with a bright flavor.

Probably only the first two are actually heirloom varieties.

The only disadvantage to growing non-modern tomatoes in a small garden is that these varieties are less resistant to blight and fungal disease than newer hybrids. That makes crop rotation a must to keep the plants healthy, and rotation is a real challenge in a space only ten by twenty. I tend to do the best I can for about four years, at which time the blight catches up to me. The only remedy I’ve found for that is to lay off planting any tomatoes in the fifth year to let the pathogens die out of the soil. It’s a real sacrifice, but after biting the bullet and planting other things I’ve been able to go back to planting my favorites without any trouble. Thank goodness, I live within two miles of an excellent farmer’s market, which helps to tide me over.

I’m almost embarassed to include this recipe because it’s so simple, but this is my favorite way to eat great home-grown tomatoes:

Insalata Caprese

Two large beefsteak tomatoes (preferably two different colors)
One round of fresh mozarella
6-8 leaves of fresh basil
olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

Slice tomatoes and mozarella into rounds and arrange in alternating slices on a plate. Drizzle with good-quality olive oil and torn leaves of Genovese basil. (If basil is cut with a knife rather than torn, the edges will turn black.) Sprinkle with salt and pepper and serve immediately. I’ve often seen restaurants add balsamic vinegar to this dish, but when you have truly great tomatoes I think that just gilds the lily. The tomatoes should be the stars, and I avoid adding anything that would cover up their already-bright flavor. Serves two.