Okay, testing new things ^^^ 😂. I’m not sure that there’s actually a market for my voice saying unscripted things, but, I’m really curious to see how this works. It’s an optional listen, btw. I can imagine using it to add extra information that’s too long to type out in an email — there are actually length limits on emails and I’m always butting up against them (as you might’ve guessed). Clicking the thing to listen to it will send you over to this email-as-a-post on Substack, just so you know.
Note that the random noises are on my end, not yours, including me clearing my throat at the beginning (professional production values!) and the clicks that my AirPods were making throughout.
ANYWAY.
There’s just one week of August left. I’m both stunned and excited. I used to be a die-hard summer person. Now I’m a die-hard cool weather person.
While I’m dreading the loss of delicious home- and local-grown produce, I can’t wait for sweat pants and hot soup and fuzzy blankets and dark evenings snuggling inside at home.
Until then, I’m scarfing down all of the fresh tomatoes and cucumbers and peppers that I can get a hold of.
I actually couldn’t decide which direction to take this edition of the Digest: preserving a bit of summer for the winter, or late summer recipes for tomato lovers.
So, I’m doing a little of both, plus recent recipes published on the blog.
Next week starts Souptember. (Yes, I did that. Please don’t hate me because I’m so souper lame.) And with it comes new soup recipes, a series on how to make great soup, and a thing or two for the Digest that could be souperbly fun or soupremely stupid.
I’ll leave the puns behind in August.
Tomato season got a fairly early start this year, thanks to — I’m not sure “thanks” is really the appropriate expression of feeling, but we’ll go with it — an incredibly hot June. So, as we hit late August, and I’ve had my fair share of fresh tomato eating, I incorporate other usages, such as this … appetizer? Condiment? Its purpose is simple: marinate some tomatoes in an herby olive oil vinaigrette and then spread it on everything.
Okay, I realize that this recipe is neither summer-preserving nor tomato-topic’d, but I published it on the blog last week because it’s one of my favorite non-soup dinners that shows up a lot in my own kitchen. So easy and loaded with the Asian-leaning flavors that we all crave … without the hassle of, you know, the actual egg roll.
Fresh tomato season will be winding down soon. Use up every last one of those beautiful orbs.
Puff Pastry Tomato Tart – A riff on a traditional corn pie, this super easy puff pastry version features cherry tomatoes, rich and creamy burrata, plus a pesto spread in place of mayo. Unique and delicious!
Tomato Lovers Tomato Salad – So, yeah, this is the ultimate tomato lovers’ salad. I usually grow many varieties of cherry tomatoes, each packed with deep tomato flavors because tomato salads are life in the summer. This salad celebrates the tomato full throttle, complete with a smoky tomato vinaigrette.
Heirloom Tomato Sandwich with Smoked Corn Mayo – This is the sandwich that all heirloom tomato lovers wait for. A hearty boule is sliced in half and spread thickly with you’ll-want-to-eat-it-by-the-spoonful smoked corn mayo. Then layer on shingles of lightly salted heirloom tomato slices in every color of the rainbow.
Sheet Pan Roasted Red Pepper & Tomato Soup – Fire engine red and bursting with tomato flavors, this soup recipe combines the convenience of sheet pan roasting and blender preparation for an almost hands-off soup. Almost because if you have a few minutes, make the paprika roux. You won’t be sorry.
More recipes for tomato lovers >
You don’t have to be a gardener or canner to preserve summer’s bounty. And you definitely should not feel the pressure to do huge batches that will last through winter. A jar of pickles here. A few ears’ worth of corn there. These are the treasures that I love uncovering deep in January as a treat that bolsters my food spirit.
Pickles happen to be some of my favorite things, so I’m featuring that here today (note: they’re all refrigerator pickles, no special equipment required). But I also have posts about preserving corn and peppers.
Pickle All the Things
Green Tomato Pickles - I do love a good pickle, and no one was more surprised than I when green tomatoes moved to the top of that list. Use up your end-of-season green tomatoes by making a batch of refrigerator pickles (no canning!). The result is unique and deliciously pickley — perfect for charcuterie boards!
Refrigerator Pickled Jalapenos - These made an appearance in the Taco Tuesday edition of the Digest, but are worth repeating here. You should be able to find jalapenos (or serranos) at farmers’ markets, and making a jar for fall tacos would not be a bad use of time.
Pickled Sweety Drops - Sweety Drop peppers — a.k.a. Biquinho peppers — are building momentum in the U.S. I can often find them already pickled in salad bars here in the Midwest, but I’ve grown them myself for the last several years. They’re bite-sized sweet peppers, and they’re absolutely awesome pickled.
Spicy Ginger Dill Refrigerator Pickles - The beautiful thing about refrigerator pickles — as opposed to water-bath canned pickles — is that you can flavor them just about any way you want without throwing off the pH balance needed for shelf-stable storage. Here, I threw some zesty ingredients into a jar, and the result was so tasty, I had to share.
More recipes for preserving summer flavors >
I wanted to add one more tomato-focused thing here, because next month we’ll be off and flying with all things soup!
I’ll be publishing this Cherry Tomato Bruschetta recipe to the blog this coming weekend. Because it piggy-backs on the Marinated Cherry Tomatoes above, I didn’t want to completely ignore it in the Digest, because it’s such a delicious way to use up those marinated tomatoes.
Normally, bruschetta is more or less a no-recipe recipe: you just schmear stuff on bread and have at it. Here, I’m using luscious burrata — a cream-filled mozzarella ball — topped with those amazing cherry tomatoes.
But instead of a crusty baguette, I used my favorite baguette substitute, fried bread. It’s crunchy and tender and olive-oily all in the same bite. It’s the perfect base for this summer treat.
Pour a very thin layer of olive oil into a skillet and heat over medium until shimmering. Place slices of bread in the skillet, making sure they have contact with the oil. Then, just let the heat and hot oil do their thing for a bit.
Check the underside of the bread every few minutes to see how it’s doing: when that underside is nice and toasty from edge to edge, flip it over.
The oil may have been completely absorbed by the first side. That’s okay. Just let the second side lightly toast. Move to a plate to cool for a minute, then load it up!
I love medium-thick sourdough slices for frying (the slices shown in the photo were more on the thin side). Just about any bakery-style bread will do but I would avoid the squishy-soft sandwich bread from the bread aisle, as it won’t firm up enough to hold toppings very well.
Until next time, friends, stay cool 🧊, stay kind 🤓, fall is coming 🍁, prepare for Souptember 🍲 because soup season is finally here 🥳
Great podcast. Please do more.