For many gardeners, Town Meeting is the reminder that it is time to plant tomato seeds. The tender seedlings must wait on windowsills to be transplanted until the threat of a late May frost has passed. And then, with a balance of sun and rain, a presence of pollinators and an absence of blight and hornworms, local tomatoes thrive and come to market at the end of July.

Last weekend, my friend Veronica gave us a basket of tomatoes from her garden, our first Vermont tomatoes of the season. After the tomato blight of last summer, local tomatoes are even more of a treat. An heirloom tomato, still warm from the sun, eaten out of hand with a pinch of salt is one of summer’s great pleasures. I used thin slices of white bread, a thick slather of mayo, two layers of tomatoes and lots of sea salt and freshly ground pepper to make a platter of tomato sandwiches. Longing for the flavor and scent of just picked tomatoes is a desire that never seems to fade.

When we lived in Singapore, our English neighbor, Philip, was on an endless quest for “a proper English tomato”. The tomatoes grown in Singapore were hard and pale orange with green patches. Although they looked like tomatoes, they didn’t have much flavor; the imported tomatoes, called airflown in Singapore, from more temperate regions were perfectly red, perfectly round and perfectly tasteless. Philip decided to grow tomatoes with seeds taken from a very expensive imported tomato. The seeds sprouted quickly and he soon had half a dozen seedlings. He tied each seedling to a stick and waited for tomatoes to appear. In three weeks, all of the seedlings had died but each of the sticks had rooted and was sprouting leaves. For the rest of his time at the university, he longed for tomatoes from England.

Fortunately, here in Vermont, during the late summer, I satisfy my tomato desire with trips to farm stands, markets and friends’ gardens. When Susan and Bob stopped by with tomatoes from their garden, I invited them to stay for dinner. I made fresh tomato sauce for pasta in the time it took for the water in the pasta pot to come to a boil. Here’s how I did it:

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The first time I was aware of fish sauce, I thought that the sewage pipe had broken in our Singapore kitchen. I was upstairs getting ready to go out to dinner and Beth, a young Filipina who lived with us, was cooking dinner for my sons. Beth was not a great cook but the boys always enjoyed the chicken adobo she made. I ran to the kitchen, expecting to have to deal with toxic waste, and found Beth laughing. She assured me that the smell was just a bit of fish sauce that she had poured into a hot pan.

I couldn’t believe that something that smelled so terrible could make anything taste good. I soon learned that fish sauce has been used, around the world for at least 2500 years to add flavor and as a main ingredient in both dipping sauces and dressings for grilled meat and fish, noodle and vegetable salads. Fish sauce is made by fermenting fish that have been layered with salt and it imparts umami, a Japanese word that translates as “good taste”, to food. Garum was the name for fish sauce to ancient Romans but it was usually referred to as that “evil smelling sauce”. Not only did Romans use it to season meat and fish dishes there is mention of its use in a pear and honey souffle!
Fish sauce is the ingredient that transformed a shrimp and vegetable salad into a Vietnamese inspired, summer salad that was grand enough to serve at an elegant dinner party. This salad combines many of the flavors of Southeast Asia and can be varied to suit your palate, pantry and pocketbook. Pork or chicken can be substituted for shrimp, and mangos or other melons can be substituted for the watermelon. Rather than making this salad in a large salad bowl I made individual salads. Here’s how I did it: … read more

As I was making papaya salad for a party we had on Friday night, my friend Victoria began to sing a song I hadn’t heard since I was eight. My father loved big band music and crooners and Perry Como was one of his favorites.

When he played his 78-rpm record of Perry Como singing Papaya Mama, my sister and I jumped around and tried to dance like Carmen Miranda. She was the Brazilian samba singer who wore hats piled high with fruit and the inspiration for Chiquita Banana. I didn’t think of papaya as something to eat until many years later.

The first time I tasted papaya, a friend had whirled it in a blender with milk and ice. The drink was a lovely pale, peachy-orange color and tasted terrible. I next tasted it a few years later with pineapple, mango and banana as part of a tropical fruit salad on a holiday in Puerto Rico and I didn’t mind it. It had a nice texture and I enjoyed it topped with a bit of lime juice.

Papaya is a native of Mexico and it is cultivated in most tropical and subtropical countries around the world. It grows on a tree-like plant that looks a bit like a small umbrella of leaves atop a very long stem. There are two types of papayas, Mexican and Hawaiian. Hawaiian papayas are small, usually weighing about a pound. Mexican papayas are much larger and may weigh as much as ten pounds. I prefer the slightly less intense flavor of the Mexican papaya. The edible seeds from the hollow center of a ripe papaya have a spicy, pepper flavor and are used in salad dressings or salsas.

Packed with vitamins, minerals and natural fiber, papaya delivers a nutritional punch. Indigenous Americans have used papaya, rich in an enzyme called papain, to tenderize tough meat for thousands of years. Rubbing papaya peel on to skin rashes, insect bites, jellyfish stings and burns is a common, natural remedy where papayas grow. Papaya extract is sold in tablet form as a remedy for digestive problems.

Although there are lots of good reasons to eat papaya, the best reason is that it is delicious, particularly when featured in an Indian inspired vegetarian dinner salad. Here’s how I made it: … read more