"GreenTomatoes" news and stories

Green tomatoes. Photo: pink_fish13, Flickr.

• Green tomatoes can become a delicious late-summer soup.
• A look at the food and fine dining of Portland, Maine, as it -- brace yourself -- gears up for frost and winter.
• At the living museum Strawbery Banke in New Hampshire, Rosh Hashana is celebrated 1919-style.
• French Languedoc wines have improved greatly over the last 25 years.
• Michael Pollan writes an op-ed piece about eating and U.S. health care.
• Food editor and developer of products like Cran-Apple juice Sylvia Schur passes away at the age of 92.
• Recipe Redux goes back in time and whips up a Huguenot Torte from 1965.
• The foods that wowed when noted chefs David Kinch, Alexandre Gauthier, Pascal Barbot and Michel Bras got cookin' on Sept. 14.
• The Minimalist makes Thai-style crab cakes.
• The classic tourist spot Tavern on the Green files for bankruptcy -- a look into why it fell.
• Restaurants: Gus & Gabriel Gastropub "fails to achieve even its low aims," Stumptown Coffee Roasters whips up exceptional espresso and Queens' M & T Restaurant offers elegant simplicity and great eats.
• Food Stuff finds purr-worthy knives, a new food processor and apple cake.
• New York's openings and closings and dining calendar.

Well, really, they are just unripe tomatoes, but we love 'em! They're great for frying and making salsa. Even though they are in the nightshade family and their leaves are poisonous, the actual fruit is edible. Not only is it edible, it's downright tasty! Tomatoes also have a powerful antioxidant called lycopene, which has similar effects to vitamin E.

And, yes, it is a fruit. At least it is in a very strict botanical sense. The problem is that it's generally considered savory rather than sweet like most other fruits. That led to a Supreme Court battle in 1893 over whether tomatoes should be considered a fruit, which weren't subject to a duty, or a vegetable, which were. I guess we know which side won.

So even though though they are savory, green tomatoes would be a sweet addition to any St Patrick's Day meal!

I had a need for green tomatoes for the stunningly marvelous idea of recreating an Austrian dessert dish - Griseknödel mit Grünen Paradeisern (Semolina Dumplings with Green Tomato Compôte). Of course I didn't realise that green tomatoes are next to bloody impossible to find in the UK.

Basically you can't get them... anywhere. Until that is my dear pal Johanna suggested the Mexican restaurant  in central London. What may turn out to be a slightly misguided idea I actually brought a pack of genuine, imported La Costeña Tomatillos. Mestizo charged me twenty quid (US$38). Excessive? Expensive? Crazy? Yep all of those!

The tin contains 6lb 4oz of imported Mexican Tomatillos. Not even certain they are the quite what I need but I am about to open them for the minuscule 6oz I need.

So people I need some ideas on how to use the rest up. I need links to recipes people!