WIAW 77 – the All Tomato Edition

Yes, I eat tomatoes three meals a day  in August… Doesn’t everyone?

All right, I admit, when I have cereal for breakfast I don’t add tomatoes to that. But a ripe red tomato is wonderful with my breakfast beans and eggs! I was reminded recently of the Full English Breakfast – which is also eggs with beans, and sausage or bacon, and – a grilled tomato. I never have grilled a tomato for breakfast, maybe that’s next…

In fact, I’m starting to seriously consider Breakfasts Around the World. My mother started it, really. When she was a young woman she hated eating cereal and then taking a long subway ride to work – she said the cereal sloshed… So she started exploring options. When I was a child, she usually ate bread with meat and cheese, a concept she got from Dutch breakfasts. (She skipped the fish they often eat…) Every culture has some concept of a Good Breakfast – and only a few limit it to something bready and something sweet, as we so often do. Most (traditionally, at least) eat a fairly solid meal – and most (not all) pull that meal together relatively quickly – plenty of leftovers and ready to eat food.  I have to start looking into this!

For lunch I made my usual salad… Now I routinely have two or three kinds of lettuce – red leaf, romaine, and sometimes a small head of bibb or tender green leaf. And this is definitely a red salad – red leaf lettuce, and red beans, and red radishes, and, of course, tomatoes! Along with romaine, scallions, cucumber, and chicken, and a homemade oil and vinegar herb dressing. And crackers on the side – for some reason I never seem to remember to take pictures of them (usually because I take them out after I put the salad on the table – and so, after I take the picture…)

I also never think to take a picture of, or mention, what I drink – water. We’re fortunate to have very good tap water here in the city, we keep a bottle in the fridge, and I just drink and refill a glass all day. At dinner, I often use a prettier glass and add ice and lemon… but still don’t take the picture. Possibly because Rich pours that for me, when he gets flatware and such. I need to pay more attention to that, though… I do occasionally drink seltzer, as well, but again just don’t think of it as part of the meal.

At dinner – well, there are tomatoes in there, but they’re cooked, so not as bright. Eggplant, patty pan squash, tomatoes, and basil, all simmered together into a Not Quite Ratatouille, with pieces of cod dropped in at the end and just cooked. Served over brown rice. Simple, fast, and good…

Trader Joe’s has Cod Pieces in the freezer section – very inexpensive, since they’re the pieces cut from the larger prettier fillets, but that’s fine with me. And it is Pacific cod – you rarely see Atlantic cod, and I won’t buy it when I do. It has been overfished literally for centuries (horribly so in recent decades,) barely survives, and needs to be protected so it comes back. I’m all for eating local, all else being equal, but there are times that other concerns seem to me more important. But cod is popular precisely because it is a firm, mild, meaty fish, and very useful for many recipes, so I’m glad to have a source I can use.

I still have a basket of tomatoes… And, at this rate, next Wednesday may be the All Cucumber post… harvest is in full swing!

Speaking of things being in full swing – so is What I Ate Wednesday.  At Arman’s this time – come on over!