Out of the Fire and Into the Frying Pan

Ahh, tomato time. Ripe, red, fresh tomates are dropping from vines all over Western New York, ready to be eaten fresh with a bit of salt, sliced on sandwiches, chopped up into salsa, or cooked into sauce.

As I have mentioned before, I am not a frequent cook. I think the last meal I cooked was possibly Thanksgiving dinner. Maybe Christmas. Anyway, it's been awhile. This is mostly because I married a fantastic and enthusiastic cook, but partly because I tend to work long hours and don't always have the energy to make an effort to pull something together when I get home.

Well, last week I picked up half a dozen slightly underripe, local tomatoes and decided to try a new dish from scratch. The recipe I chose was Baked Pasta with Caramelized Tomatoes from Susan Herrmann Loomis's French Farmhouse Cookbook. It is a great cookbook if you like simple, homey foods and interesting anecdotes and background on each dish and the regions they come from. I should point out that nowhere in the recipe is the pasta actually baked in the oven--this is all made on the cooktop. This makes it great for a summer night when you don't want to heat the house by turning on the oven. Here is the recipe:

Ingredients

6 good sized, slightly underripe tomatoes, cored.

1/4 cup olive oil

3 cloves garlic, peeled, halved and green germ removed

1 cup loosely packed flat leaf parsley leaves

sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

10 ounces dried pasta, such as fettucine

1/2 cup finely grated Parmesan cheese

Directions

1. Cut the tomatoes in half horizontally.

2. Place the oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. When it is hot but not smoking (when small ripples move over its surface), add the tomatoes, cut side up. Cook, shifting tehm slightly in the pan to avoid scorching, until this skin is slightly bubbled on the bottom and has a golden spot on it, about 4 minutes. Turn the tomatoes and continue cooking until the cut side is golden, about 6 minutes. Shake the pan two or three times to move the tomatoes around so they don't burn.

3. While the tomatoes are cooking, finely mince the garlic and parsely together.

4. Turn the tomatoes again, so the cut side is up. Working around teh tomatoes, scrape up any browned bits from the bottom of the skillet. Sprinkle the tomatoes with the garlic and parsley, and season them genrously with salt and pepper. Reduce the heat to medium and cover the skillet. Cook the tomatoes until they are tender through and the garlic is tender, about 10 minutes, shaking the pan occasionally to prevent the tomatoes from sticking. The juice from the tomatoes will turn a deep caramel color but shouldn't burn.

5. While the tomatoes finish cooking, fill a large pot 2/3 full with salted water and bring it to a boil. Add the pasta, stir, and cook until it is al dente, about 10 minutes. Drain, reserving 1 cup of the pasta cooking liquid. Return the pasta to the pot, pour half the reserved cooking liquid over it, and toss so the pasta is thoroughly moistened.


6. Arrange the tomatoes around the edges of a large warmed platter. Deglaze the skillet with the remaining pasta cooking liquid, scraping up any browned bits, and pour that over the pasta as well. Toss so the liquid is well blended with the pasta. Transfer the pasta to the center of the serving platter, so it is surrounded with the tomatoes. Serve immediately, with the Parmesan cheese alongside.

Serves 4-6.



From start to finish, dinner took me just about an hour. I served the tomatoes along with a roasted pork tenderloin with the Wegman's balsamic vinegar marinade. A delicious and fairly simple fresh feast.