Plate to Plate

You should have seen the bag of tomatoes we foisted on the poor market fellow. It must have weighed at least six pounds. I hope it weighed at least six pounds, because it was expensive. Heirloom tomatoes: so delicious, so pricey.

So when I got home yesterday afternoon, and examined our market purchases, it seemed the best thing to do with those new potatoes and firm, fresh tomatoes would be to make a small gratin. The recipe I followed, sort of, was from Deborah Madison’s Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, my dog-eared, stained, wrinkled kitchen staple. Her gratin was more Provençal, but since I didn’t have thyme, and lemons are in no way local, I used the basil and parsely I had on hand. (I did use the olives, though. I couldn’t resist the olives.)

Dan and I gobbled up the entire gratin. The whole thing! It had the kind of stunning, sweet, fresh taste that makes you happy to be alive. I couldn’t believe it had come out of the oven! I remember thinking to myself that if kids ate like this, they’d love vegetables. Love them. Who knows, though–I’ve always loved vegetables. I could have a warped perspective.

In any case, we also had wonderful, simple salad of mixed baby greens, spicy sprouts, and blue cheese from Jasper Hill Farm. I attempted to cook a beet in the microwave, to have with our salad, but it was a disaster which ended up shorting out the microwave and producing an acrid plume of smoke. Will continue to roast beets the old-fashioned way.

Finally, we topped it all off with a homemade, nearly all-local peach ice cream, which I couldn’t photograph properly in the post-sundown kitchen under the CFL bulbs. (Does anyone else have this problem? Everything looks horrid under those lights, no matter how I try to adjust the white balance.)

The custard-based ice cream recipe was from Cook’s Illustrated, and we found it just a bit too sweet and intense, so we’ll be reworking it for the next batch. But fresh ice cream? I really can’t complain.

- Heirloom tomatoes [Walloomsac Farmers' Market - Bennington, VT - 18 mi]
- Fingerling potatoes [same]
- Basil [Williamstown Farmers' Market - Williamstown, MA - 5 mi]
- Parsley [Melanie & Jay's garden - Plainfield, MA - 21 mi]
- Spicy sprouts [Gill Greenery - Gill, MA - 45 mi]
- Baby salad greens [Mighty Food Farm - Pownal, VT - 10 mi]
- Bayley Hazen blue cheese [Jasper Hill Farm - Greensboro, VT - 192 mi]

Decidedly not local: kalamata olives, EVOO, salt, pepper, vinegar