Thursday, August 21, 2008

one local supper- 20 aug

let's talk about something pleasant, shall we? Like last night's wowser local supper. This, friends, is my famous (well, to me) tomato cobbler. Several years ago Martha and Oprah made a tomato cobbler with a gruyere crust and all sorts of fantastical goodness. I had a currant tomato plant of seven at the time, which translates to hundreds of pinkie-sized tomatoes. What to do with them? Pile them in a ramekin, gratin dish, or casserole with herbs, onions (I used shallots then, halved baby onions yesterday), breadcrumbs, and a scant dusting of cornstarch stirred into the tomatoes just to bind everything together. Bake around 400 for 30 minutes or until you can't wait anymore. If you're not trying to be local (and out of local cheese), gruyere is fabulous with this. So is a chapeau of whole wheat pastry. Simple was divine, too.

Next to it is the arugula man's spicy mesclun mix, topped with sauteed green beans and bell peppers. The peppers were orange and red, and those baby onions play a starring role here, too. They were still hot when I placed them over the greens, so they and their pan juices wilted the greens just slightly and formed a dressing. Little boy declined on everything but the green beans. He had a non-local hebrew nation kosher beef dog instead.

Yesterday was a cool and rainy day- I spent the entirety of it working on this piece. It is so beautiful and will be so pretty when it's finished, but it took about 3 hours, start to not-quite-finished. The fern got painted and waxed, but it was too humid (steady rain all day) to dip the background. I'm not charging enough-this piece was custom, so the next time I make one of these the price will go up significantly. Some ferns are simple and easy to paint, but this type was painstaking. Learn as we go, don't we?

Happy Thursday!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Yes, this looks really really delicious. Thanks for sharing the recipe.