This lighter take on the classic recipe will be gobbled up as quickly as the original—and is still best served with applesauce and sour cream.
Haute ham and eggs! These appetizers are protein-rich, and cutting out the crust makes them incredibly low-cal.
In late summer, when tomatoes are at their ripest, I crave slices of heirlooms and mozzarella sprinkled with sea salt and olive oil, rather than a cold soup of diced raw veggies, heavy on the tomatoes. Then I tried a gazpacho by Dani Garcia, a prodigy of molecular cooking and chef at Restaurant Calima, in Marbella, off the southern coast of Spain. His gazpacho is a sweet puree of cherry tomatoes studded with pistachios and anchovies, topped with cheese snow (made with liquid nitrogen). In this version, whirl native tomatoes with garlic, chilies, sherry vinegar, and cumin.
Pipérade (Gascon) or Piperrada (Basque), from piper (pepper in Gascon) is a typical Basque dish prepared with onion, green peppers, and tomatoes sautéd in olive oil and flavoured with red Espelette pepper. The colours coincidentally reflect the colours of the Basque flag (red, green and white). It may be served as a main or a side dish. Typical additions include egg, garlic or meats such as ham.
Gazpacho as most people know it is the Andalusian soup of fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, and stale bread. This chilled soup also includes a slew of cold vegetable purees, some that omit tomatoes and add almonds. White gazpacho reflects Spain’s ancient Arabic past. These bowls of soup would have been made with a mortar and pestle, but use a blender and give it plenty of time to whir and lots of olive oil, and you’ll get a velvety texture. Let the soup mellow for at least several hours in the refrigerator or overnight for optimal flavor.
LIGHTER than fruit juice, much more fun and flavorful than water, agua fresca is, quite simply, a very watery version of juice. To look at it another way, it’s a wonderfully value-added version of water. Fresca translates as both “fresh” and “cool,” and the drink is both. This Mexican specialty can be made from seeds, like tamarind, or even some grains but given that it’s midsummer I’m sticking with fruit: any melon (including papaya and the melon-related cucumber), pineapple or any stone fruit.
Frequently, tomatoes and corn are teamed with basil, garlic and balsamic vinegar — as if it were somehow an Italian creation. Though it isn’t, it’s both gorgeous and delicious that way. If this kind of salad has any roots at all, they are Californian. Made as described above, it smacks of the Bay Area in the 1980s, when American ingredients were heralded but the cooking was most strongly influenced by classic French and 20th-century Italian.
Plum tomatoes made me think of plums, and I briefly imagined making a B.L.P. But had it not been for the tomato shortage, I might never have tried it. Before I risked my lunch I sought expert advice. I knew that at Anthos Upstairs, Michael Psilakis substituted watermelon for tomatoes in a shrimp dish. So I asked him what else a tomato lover might do to compensate. “Stone fruit,” he said.
You can’t always find tamarind-date chutney, even in Asian or Indian markets. Use tamarind chutney, which is sticky, sweet, and a citrusy match for the honey.
