Almost Enough Tomatoes

This is just the tomatoes that have come into our lives in the last day.

Between our two farm shares, the four plants out front, and a peach-picking trip hastily turned tomato-picking trip*, we are starting to have something almost approaching nearly as many gorgeous ripe local heirloom tomatoes as we can manage to eat.

I know, #firstworldproblem.

Jack and I scored a co-op hat trick, using up a rock-hard forgotten half baguette, some basil we'd grown ourselves, and a bunch of the tomatoes in a panzanella, or bread salad. (Incidentally, the New York Times apparently did a whole series on things to make with stale bread?)

Then Jack made a fresh tomato sauce over diced eggplant, sort of inspired by Cook's Illustrated's vegetable lasagna. (We also salted and microwaved the eggplant before cooking, as described in the Cook's recipe, which had the result of making one of our housemates ask "Where'd you get all the mushrooms?")

But Anna did it best, with a simple plate of sliced tomatoes topped with balsamic vinegar, a little oil, and salt. Yum!

* A field trip to Smolak Farms (where we had great success picking peaches and plums and nectarines last year) to pick peaches before they were blown down in the hurricane was a disappointment because of 1) lack of ripe peaches, and 2) lack of hurricane. Fortunately, they also have you-pick heirloom tomatoes.