Here’s a little something that the fancy food bloggers
don’t want you to know: the best thing you can eat right now is a salad of
summer tomatoes, at least where I live. I went to a lunch the other day at a
friend’s house and there was an impressive amount of food all made with care
and skill yet for me nothing could top the tomato salad with a bit of chopped
garlic and olive oil. I have favored the tomatoes of the Mediterranean since I
lived in Greece 30 years ago and good tomatoes have always been something I
look for wherever I have lived.
At the one of the corner vegetable shops the other day
I bought two small bags of tomatoes, one of higher quality to eat in a salad
and the others I planned to use in a sauce. The sauce tomatoes didn’t look too
appetizing as they had irregularities and wouldn’t win any prizes in a contest.
The higher quality tomatoes were a bit green and would need a day or so to
ripen so I cut up one of the ugly tomatoes to eat today. I cut it roughly,
added a pinch of salt and a few drops of olive oil and it was delicious. For
this photo I added some chopped garlic, a few olives, and some freshly cut
basil (I have a couple plants on my little balcony).
This is about as good as food gets. Of course, there
are endless variations on this tomato salad theme. You can add a few spoons of
canned tuna, red onions macerated in vinegar, or whatever you have in the kitchen.
Top this off with a piece of bread and a glass of wine and you have a meal
you’d be thrilled with in a restaurant.
