SQUASHED TOMATOES AND BLOODY MARY SORBET

I have an on-off relationship with tomatoes. Mostly off. Being so often tasteless renders them largely pointless. Served ‘grilled’ for breakfast – slightly - burned, hard and cold in the middle is morning misery. Ubiquitous in every salad, their presence seldom brings anything fun to the party. And wetly squished into every variety of sandwich creates sludgy bread. There are two main reasons for this. First the tomatoes we buy are mostly Dutch and therefore cultivated in a sterile poly-tunnels on reclaimed topsoil. They lack nutrients, vivyfying sun and character. The gall of supermarkets who sell us these flabby imitations 'vine grown for flavour'. As if there were any other way. Secondly because if we only slice it, we do nothing to improve the tomato’s potential. They need to be prepared. Skinned, seeded and rid of that nasty core. You need to bring out the tomato-ey-ness.

My father used to obsess about Ailsa Craigs, the tomatoes we grew in the greenhouse. Grown in horse dung, the little green husks had an overpowering grassy fragrance and the green seeds were sharp and tasty. You could just sprinkle a little salt and gobble in one go. But it’s hard to find tomatoes like these. In Scotland Valvona and Crolla in Edinburgh have the best from Sicily. Victoria’s Plums, the shop attached to the Sun Inn at Dedham in Suffolk imports the best range I’ve seen. And of course you can find them around in London and they do taste good. But dear at the same price by kilo as decent meat or fish. Still they are a delight with a really creamy bufala di mozzarella, some basil and ground pepper.

Actually I mostly use tinned tomatoes. They start in Italy and so some flavour is guaranteed. They are great when it comes to sauces and soups and there is no need to use those watery ragus and passata from a jar. Easy as pie. In a heavy bottom pan brown off some garlic chopped large into olive oil. Note on garlic – the finer you chop garlic, the more intensely it impacts the food around it and the more it hangs on the breath – which is why the worst garlic hangover is from Chinese restaurants where they generally use powdered garlic. Chopping large bestows a nutty, chewiness. To get the best from garlic, take a clove and bash it with the flat of a knife blade so it slightly crushes. Then nip off the burr and it will just slide out of the husk. Then chop to taste. No peeling, fiddly picking or silly garlic crusher.

So back to the pan. When the oil is spitting, pull it off the hob for a moment. Take any number of tins of plum tomatoes - I usually use six - and squeeze out all the watery juice, so there’s only flesh. Empty this into the pan with some salt and whole green peppercorns (the pickled ones are good) and cook very slowly for a few hours. Watch it reduce and darken. The smell in the house is so good, I made sure I was making this when we sold our last flat. It will keep jarred in the fridge for weeks. Rich and crimson, it pushes flavour into everything it touches.

I was clearing space for the Christmas imposters in my fridge last year and decided to use up my remaining tomato sauce. I had just inherited an ice cream churn. I devised this Bloody Mary sorbet. It’s seriously simple and quite showy: vodka, fino sherry, tabasco, a dollop of horseradish, celery salt, black pepper and your tomato sauce and – brilliant – some capers! Churn it and serve it soft with langoustines, lobster, crab and crayfish. It will be a definite hit.

And a tip for breakfast, halve them, get rid of the seeds and core, sprinkle some brown sugar over the shells and now grill with a pinch of thyme or marjoram. Tell me they aren’t the best accompaniment to crispy streaky bacon, fried bread and cod’s roe.

TENDER WORDS

Tender (2009) tells the story of Nigel Slater's love affair with his garden in Islington and the many seedlings he has raised in his box-hedged vegetable patches. It’s a magnificent volume, like a medieval knightly treatise with pictures of his Eden, its produce and many of the recipes he has created from them.

23 May, 2010

FOOD FROM THE HEART

Cooking is a basic human instinct. We’ve been eating, chopping, shaping, flavouring, enticing ingredients into something delicious since time began. But as the way many of us live has changed, the basic skills we require to cook, are no longer valued and it’s often easier to let others take control of what we eat.

21 April, 2010

IN A RIGHT FISH STEW

This week we had sustainable fish stew. It’s a quick and easy way to feed a gang of hungries on a Friday night and doesn’t need much else but some good bread and wine. Like all stews, you need balance, rich liquid and a range of potent flavours steaming from your pot.

15 March, 2010