Food Whims

When I told Roommate I was going to make these sandwiches, her response involved some reference to the movie Fried Green Tomatoes, of course, and then she told me she’d never actually eaten fried green tomatoes. Say what?!

Pause… Ok, so maybe that’s reasonable. Not many people have had friend green tomatoes. So, for all you out there that have yet to try fried green tomatoes, here is the most delicious way to eat them next to plunging them in ketchup: make a BLT with fried green tomatoes instead of slices of tomatoes!

First, fry a few slices of bacon to the crispiness that you like best. Bacon crispiness is an art – whenever I cooked breakfast for my 4 roommates in college, I knew just how to cook the bacon for each one. It’s like how the newbies at West Point have to know how many cubes of ice to put in peoples’ drinks. I don’t know if that really happens, but they told us that on the tour…

Sorry… back to the recipe.

Ok. This recipe works best if you have everything ready to assemble as soon as the tomatoes are done. So have your lettuce washed and ready, bacon fried, bread toasted (use you’re fave GF bread here… I used my friend Lou’s bread — you should check out her booth, True Nature’s Child, at the SFC Downtown Market if you live in Austin), and spread ready. Usually I just use some mayonnaise, but this time around I wanted to add a little kick so I mixed some sriracha with the mayo. Try it. I dare ya.

For the green tomatoes: slice ‘em thick like you would a red tomato for burgers. Get two shallow dishes ready (pie plates work great for this). In the first, mix together one slightly beaten egg and about 1/4 cup of milk. In the second, mix together 1/4 cup corn meal (a finer ground would work better here… it’s not fun to bite into a coarse piece of uncooked cornmeal), 2 Tbsp. sorghum flour, 2 Tbsp. glutinous rice flour, salt, pepper, and any other seasonings you’re feeling.

In a frying pan, heat about 1/4 cup of safflower oil over medium heat (or if you have enough bacon grease, you can use that… be careful not to use it for too many batches because you’ll accumulate a lot of burnt remnants after about the second batch). While the oil is heating up, prep the tomatoes. For each slice, dunk it in flour, eggs, and flour again. Got it? Flour, eggs, flour. Once you’ve got 4-5 ready to go, (carefully) throw them in the pan and let them cook for a 1-2 minutes on each side, until it’s a nice golden brown. If the oil gets too hot, you’ll notice the tomatoes brown more quickly and don’t get cooked through enough. So watch it!

Now it’s assembly time. Bread, spread, tomatoes, bacon, lettuce, bread… or whatever your order is.

Enjoy!
Abigail