Better yet, let’s have my late grandmother be the judge. (Trust me, there was nothing she couldn’t judge.) Grandma Trudy enjoyed giving gifts – truly, she did. She chose my and my siblings’ birthday, holiday, graduation gifts with care. But the part she loved? I mean, lived for? That would be the actual giving of gifts, because immediately following the giving came the reciting of disclaimers.

If you don’t like it, it can go back. I like it. Don’t like the color? Gray is nice. I can get it in blue. Really, gray’s fine. If sweaters make you itch, it goes back. Sweaters are fine. So you know! Receipt is in the box.

I’m certain that if grandma were alive and food blogging, it would go something like this:

So, Cherry Tomato & Maytag Blue Beignets. What? Sounds fancy. Sounds like a lot of fat. If you don’t want fat, don’t eat it.

Tomatoes, I like tomatoes. Not too many tomatoes – heartburn. You don’t have heartburn? Good for you! Eat the tomatoes.


Who frys in summer? My doctor says no frying. And if you don’t like cooking don’t cook! Just order in. Wait – I’ve got menus in the drawer.


So, they’re pretty. But they remind me of – what are those things, in the bread, with the lettuce and funny sauce, on Dempster Street, in the round bread? I don’t know. They remind me of those.

I have to say, these were not bad, not bad, might even be okay – but vey schmeer, the work. Who needs work in the kitchen? Your grandpa, he makes French toast in the kitchen. He’s crazy. If you don’t like work, this recipe can go back.

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Makes 35-50, depending on tomato size. Serve warm or at room temperature as an appetizer, on a brunch buffet, or as a very fancy sports snack.

CHERRY TOMATO & MAYTAG BLUE BEIGNETS

2 1/4 teaspoons yeast
1/4 cup warm water

2 tablespoons vegetable shortening
1/3 cup water

4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/8 teaspoon white pepper, ground
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 egg, lightly beaten

small wedge Maytag Blue Cheese, about 5 oz. (Stilton would also work well)
35-50 cherry tomatoes, small size, in season (I used locally-grown Sun Golds)

vegetable oil, for frying
sea salt, white pepper and cayenne pepper, for rolling
chives or other herbs for garnish, chopped fine
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Make beignet dough: Place yeast in large bowl (if using stand mixer, bottom of mixer bowl) and pour 1/4 cup warm water over yeast to dissolve. Set aside until yeast is bubbling and activated. Place 1/3 cup water and vegetable shortening in small microwave-safe bowl. Microwave on high for 20-25 seconds, until shortening begins to melt. Remove and stir until shortening is completely melted.

Sift flour with sugar, sea salt and white pepper. Add melted shortening, buttermilk, and beaten egg to activated yeast. Whisk (or use paddle attachment, on mixer) together to combine. Add 2 cups of the flour mixture (by hand with a wooden spoon, by mixer with paddle on low) until a wet, sticky mass forms. Gradually add remaining 2 cups of flour to form a shaggy but fully combined dough. NOTE: Humidity makes a difference. If dough looks wet and sticky, add more flour. If dough begins to look dry and resists mixing, stop adding flour.

Roll and form beignets: Turn dough out onto lightly floured surface. Turn over once or twice to smooth – but don’t knead it. Roll dough into a large rectangle, 1/8 – 1/4″ thick. Using pastry or pizza wheel, mark 1 1/2″ x 1 1/2″ squares. Place one cherry tomato and a generous dab of blue cheese in center of each square. Pinch up corners of each square to meet, pressing edges together to seal, then roll beignet between palms to create a seamless ball. Place on a foil or parchment-lined sheet pan, and continue rolling filled beignets until done. NOTE: beignets may be formed up to one day in advance. Cover loosely with foil and store in refrigerator until ready to fry.

Frying beignets: Line a sheet pan or large plate with paper towels. Sprinkle the paper towels with an even, fine layer of sea salt, then large dashes of cayenne and white pepper, to taste.

In large pot or deep fryer, heat vegetable oil (at least a few inches) to approximately 360°. I recommend using a fry/candy thermometer to monitor oil temperature – too low and beignets will be heavy and greasy; too high and you’ll get dark outsides, raw insides. When oil is hot (test a small piece of dough – if it puffs to the top, it’s ready) drop the beignets into the pot one by one, working in small batches.  Beignets should puff and brown quickly, about 1-2 minutes. If beignets do not rise and puff, slightly raise heat. If beignets burn too fast, slightly lower heat.

When beignets are evenly gold-brown, remove from oil and drain on “seasoned” paper towel-lined pan. When you have several warm beignets on pan, pick up edges of paper towels, allowing beignets to roll and coat with seasoning. Continue frying batches of beignets until done, rolling each batch in seasoning (add more salt/cayenne/white pepper if necessary).

Serving: serve warm or at room temperature, up to four hours after frying. May garnish with chopped chives or other herbs, as desired.

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Summer Fest is an annual online celebration of good food and great ideas, featuring food and garden bloggers from around the globe. Every week we highlight a different seasonal ingredient – corn, stone fruit, tomatoes – and our guest bloggers share great recipes, stories and tips. You can participate by visiting these terrific blogs and leaving links or comments – and if you’re feeling particularly inspired, you can contribute a post of your own. Drop by A Way to Garden for details on how join the party.

THIS WEEK’S LINKS: TOMATOES

Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef: Heirloom Tomato Tart with Parmesan Crust

Nicole at Pinch My Salt: What to do with slow-roasted tomatoes

Alison at Food2: Heirloom tomatoes

The FN Dish: Tyler’s Ultimate Tomato Salads

Margaret at A Way to Garden: More than one way to ripen a tomato

Gilded Fork: Celebrating summer lusciousness with a tomato dossier and recipes

Diane and Todd at White on Rice Couple: Sun-dried tomatoes (actually made in the sun!)

Paige at The Sister Project: 3 substantial, healthy, vegetarian tomatoey main dishes

Liz at the Cooking Channel: Easy Tomato Tart

Kelly at Just a Taste: Tomato Jam

Alexis at Food Network UK: The seven deadly tomato sins

Michelle at Healthy Eats: Top 10 Things to Do With Tomatoes

Alana at Eating From the Ground Up: Roasted Green Salsa (green zebras and tomatillos), and how late August makes her hurt for New Mexico

Caron at San Diego Foodstuff: Chunky Garden Gazpacho with Flowered Corn Tortillas and Melissa Clark’s Tomato Tarte Tatin

Judy at Over a Tuscan Stove: Tomatoes, the Italian Way

Caroline at the Wright Recipes: Savory Tomato Crumble

Tigress in a Pickle: Over 50 ways to preserve tomatoes in jars

Cate at Sweetnicks: Loaded Bowl of Deliciousness

“I don’t know,” he said, and I gaped at him. “It just seems pointless.” Ah. There we are, that’s why, the point. My husband the attorney, the arrow thinker, does not like needless complication. He cannot grasp a situation that doesn’t have a point. I too like hitting the right note, but that’s not always been the case. There was a time, pre-culinary school-discipline-makeover, when I complicated all sorts of things. I frequently made simple things much harder than they had to be, things like:

That Medieval Times birthday cake: I’d already built battlements from a two-ton carrot cake. Did it really need that working gingerbread drawbridge and chocolate moat?

That six-tier wedding cake for the rabbit lovers: I agreed to carve bride and groom rabbits – they asked for black rabbits, a specific breed – out of Sculpey. Did she need that tiny strand of pearls, did he really need a rabbit tux? With a hole for his tail?

That banana tart for the Cuban-themed restaurant audition: did it really need rum, caramel, coconut, lime, white chocolate and a little umbrella? Perhaps I should have dressed it in a little marzipan t-shirt stamped “TROPICS?”

The overdoing went on a long time, until chef training beat it out of me. By necessity, I learned to create lovely things with speed and efficiency, things that didn’t stray. Lesson learned: if you don’t have two extra hours, don’t make a chocolate moat.

By now I should know, should know better. An unadorned tomato is best, but even in August I wanted to crank up the oven and bake – with tomatoes. The fact that it’s time for quick, cold and easy would, apparently, keep me from mixing bread dough, spreading filling, rolling and chopping and waiting for dough to rise. Twice.

Summer’s almost over, so a little side trip, one foot in the garden and one eye toward woolly fall, is no waste of time. Not the most efficient recipe, but so strong was the savory bread in my mind, a sort of deep dish-flavored sticky bun, that I bucked the heat to make it anyway and hope you will, too. It’s needlessly complicated, too true, but when you serve this edible centerpiece to oohs and ahhs, when they are reeling in tomato-steam and pulling apart crusty rolls, you might think: not complicated. Simply good, and worth it.

Summer Fest bounded through the season with a fabulous group of bloggers. What’s everyone cooked up for the finale?

♥ Margaret Roach at A Way to Garden has troubled tomatoes, but is still Making Quick Tomato Sauce, Ever so Slowly

♥ Matt Armendariz at MattBites features not one, not two, but an incredible Tomatoes Ten Ways, including Roasted Tomato Bloody Mary and cold Heirloom & Fennel Soup.

♥ Jaden Hair at Steamy Kitchen stacks a beautiful Caprese Salad with Basil Vinaigrette.

♥ Diane & Todd at White on Rice Couple are showing off gorgeous Tomato Jam Recipes and tales of Kiddie Tomato Thieves

♥ Shauna & Daniel Ahern at Gluten-Free Girl making I-want-it-right-now Smoked Tomato Salsa

♥ Paige Smith Orloff at The Sister Project is dishing up “the Greatest” – Curried Carrot & Tomato Soup.

And also you! Summer Fest is a great way to explore new voices, get new ideas and contribute your own. Hopscotch around the blogs, find what you like and please leave something to share, like recipes, links or tips. Do you grow great tomatoes, have the perfect summer recipe? Introduce yourself, and comment away.  Readers have exchanged so many delicious ideas – so swing by the blogs, and enjoy the best of summer.

UPSIDE-DOWN TOMATO BASIL BREAD

serves 12-16

Dough

2 1/2 teaspoons (or 1 package) active dry yeast
1 cup plus 3 tablespoons warm water
4 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon olive oil
3 3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
2 teaspoons sea salt
1 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper (or three-pepper mix)

cornmeal, for sprinkling

Filling

4 – 5 tablespoons fresh basil, finely chopped (basil from store produce pkg, about 1 oz)
1 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup olive oil
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper (or three-pepper mix)
fresh-ground red pepper flakes, to your more hot/less hot taste -or- 1/2 teaspoon hot red pepper flakes

Tomato Topping

3 large or 4 small-medium tomatoes

optional for sprinkling: 1/4 teaspoon each: sea salt, sugar, red pepper flakes

Make Bread Dough:

Using mixer: Stir the yeast into warm water in mixer bowl; let stand about 10 minutes, until yeast looks bubbled and creamy. Fit mixer with dough hook. Stir in olive oil first, combining with yeast, then mix in flour, Parmesan cheese, sea salt, ground black pepper and hot pepper flakes. Start mixing on low and increase to medium speed, kneading about 5 minutes, until dough is combined, soft and elastic.

If dough looks too dry: add water while mixer kneads, few drops at a time, until dough just combines. If dough looks too wet: add tiny dashes of flour while mixer kneads, sparingly, until sides of bowl look clean and dough combines.

Place dough in lightly oiled bowl; cover loosely with plastic wrap, then dish towel. Set aside and let rise until doubled, about 2 hours. Dough should feel very smooth, moist and soft.

While dough rises, make filling & tomato topping.

Make Filling:

In small bowl, place chopped fresh basil, Parmesan cheese, olive oil, sea salt, ground pepper and red pepper flakes. Stir to combine well, and set aside.

Tomato Topping:

Remove cores and chop tomatoes to small, rough pieces. Place in bowl (without accumulated liquid) and set aside.

Assemble Tomato Basil Bread

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F

Lightly oil (with olive oil) bottom and sides of 10″ round cake or springform pan (can also use 9 x 13 metal pan, Pyrex dish, or similar). Drain any excess juices from chopped tomatoes, then spread evenly over bottom of pan. Set aside.

Turn risen bread dough out on lightly floured surface. Gently pull and stretch dough to a rough rectangle, approximately 11″ x 24″. Using spatula, gently spread Filling evenly across dough to cover, reaching edges. Starting at long edge, roll dough up jelly roll style, as for cinnamon rolls. Try to roll evenly and without air gaps. With seam side facing down, make sure filled roll is solid and combined by patting sides and edges.

Using a thin, sharp knife (serrated is best) cut 1″ slices from dough roll. Arrange slices, spiral side down, on top of chopped tomatoes in prepared pan. In a 10″ round pan, you will have little to no room between slices (if using a larger pan, arrange slices barely touching, with small amounts of space between them.) Cover lightly with plastic wrap and allow to rise slightly, about 20 minutes.

Place filled pan on wider sheet pan or foil (important – to catch drips!) Bake on lower rack 40 – 45 minutes, until top rolls are medium brown, feel hollow when tapped, and tomato juices have bubbled and thickened. Remove from oven and cool on rack for 5 minutes.

To unmold & serve: Have a platter or cake stand ready that is wider than the bread pan. Cover browned top of rolls with platter or stand (pan will still be warm, use oven mitt.) Holding platter to pan together, turn over in one motion until pan is upside down. Use a knife to carefully lift pan from bread, releasing steam slowly. After releasing initial steam, lift pan off completely, revealing tomato-topped bread. Serve immediately.

If you’d like darker edges and more caramelization - it’s beautiful and delicious that way – preheat the broiler. When hot, mix together optional sea salt, sugar and red pepper flakes. Slide whole bread onto a sheet pan, then sprinkle salt mixture over tomato topping. Place under broiler for 1 – 2 minutes, watching carefully, until tomatoes sizzle and edges blacken. Remove and serve.

bread dough inspired by Carol Field, The Italian Baker

What’s Summer Fest? The wonderful Margaret Roach, she of A Way to Garden and The Sister Project, invited me to participate in Summer Fest 2009, a regular cross-blogging party: every week a new food-from-the-garden theme meets several well-known bloggers, including Margaret, Matt Armendariz, Jaden Hair, and White on Rice Couple’s Todd and Diane. Also popping up: Shauna and Daniel Ahern from Gluten-Free Girl, Paige Smith Orloff of The Sister Project, and, for the love of pie crust, me.

Summer Fest 2009 Schedule

Tuesday, July 28: HERBS

Tuesday, August 4: FRUITS from TREES

Tuesday, August 11: BEANS-AND-GREENS WEEK

Tuesday, August 18: TOMATO WEEK

It’s Tomato Week! Drop by the blogs to share your own links, recipes, and ideas.

Your eyes are drooping, and your hands are chapped – possibly from dragging piles of ripped and flattened cardboard outside in a really earnest effort to recycle all your moving boxes, only to be foiled by freaking mother nature when 8 inches of snow fell right on the boxes, and now your moving day has left a huge soggy carbon footprint on the earth, but whatever.

Okay. Inside your new friend, the kitchen, awaits. You’re feeling ready to kick the place off with a meal – a true, hot, eat-at-the-table rib-sticking meal.

And look! Over there is the pantry of your dreams, and it’s got loads of storage like you’ve never had before. It’s filled with pretty, smooth-gliding pullout shelves that are really great and really….empty.

Wow. Really empty.

But lucky me – I’d optimistically dragged one scraggly onion, flour, sugar, cornmeal, and a few cans of stuff with me to our interim apartment (where we never cooked a thing) and then dragged the same stuff into the new house. This delightfully Laura Ingalls-like move appeared crazy at the time (keeping a scraggly onion?) but it became the makings of our first good meal at home. A new home.

Find your biggest pot.*

If you can figure out where the hell you put it.

Hunk of meat (here, boneless chuck roast), salt and pepper. You did bring salt and pepper, right?

A few cans of stewed or diced tomatoes (pictured here, the dragged cans)

Crank your stove up high – yes, you too, Mom, you, who are afraid to let the flames go past the sides – add a little oil and let those flames leap up high until the meat is seared brown on both sides.

Add the scraggly onion and if you’ve got them, a few scraggly carrots. New ones are fine, too.

Add the can or two of tomatoes right over the top. In one exquisite moment, a cloud of caramelized tomato, onion, carrot and beef will explode into the best aromatherapy you could ever hope for.

Carefully, but with feeling, inhale. Feel better already about this moving thing.

Although you will be reluctant to cover this beautiful sight, cover it tight and let it simmer for a good few hours, until it’s falling apart. Until the new house smells so warm and roasting and good that you believe you actually live here. It will smell so good in your kitchen that people outside will follow the scent and they will want to live there, too.

Simmer until it starts bubbling out and messing up your pristine new stovetop. When it’s really messy and also fork-tender, it’s done.

Like this.

I found another pot and made polenta, because it’s delicious underneath the roast and its tomato-y juices. I did have cornmeal – and by now most of America knows that polenta is just just fancy and overpriced cooked cornmeal. And a darn good fast side dish, too.

Slice, shred, or rip the pot roast up and serve it over polenta with the roast juices and vegetables.

If some thoughtful friend has brought you a housewarming bottle of red wine, this would be an excellent time to pop it open. What box is the corkscrew in again?

This is comfort food. You’ll forget all about how much moving and unpacking sucks – until you go to find the dish scrubber. So enjoy it now.

* Just a note to say you could definitely do this in a slow-cooker or crockpot or some such thing if you wish. I only have the big blue pot, and it does great and even cleans up great. But slow cook away.