Day 23: Farm to Fork - Tomatoes

My neighbor Sushma lives on a farm down the road and has been growing a lot of summer vegetables this season. She had a particularly good harvest of tomatoes this time and had lots of extra tomatoes to go around, so she gave us a few kilos this evening.

I was hoping they were an indigenous (local word: naati) variety so I could save the seeds of one of the fruits to plant in my kitchen garden. But Sushma clarified that they were not naati, but hybrid tomatoes. And the thing with hybrid fruits is that they have been genetically modified to yield certain characteristics in that particular generation, but you cannot be certain that the next generation of those plants will necessarily give you just as good results, because the genes would have changed. So you would probably have better luck planting seeds saved from natural indigenous varieties.

But what I loved about these tomatoes that Sushma gave me was that because they were organically grown without growth promoters, or size, shape and colour regulating chemicals, in just two kilos of tomatoes I saw such a variety of characteristics. I even got a pair of Siamese twin tomatoes!

On reaching home the tomatoes were immediately washed and quartered, and doused in EVOO, some salt, garlic and a bunch of fresh herbs (yes, from the herb pots in my kitchen garden!). They were then thrown into a preheated oven at the lowest temperature, (160°C) and slow-cooked for about 2 to 2½ hours.

They came out of there sweet and sour and delightfully jammy, with the natural sugars of the fruit  beautifully caramelized! Too divine to be able to describe in words.

This tomato compote will go onto some lightly toasted bread and then straight into my tum-tum for breakfast tomorrow! :D