Katie Meadow

In Vivian Howard's first book, "Deep Run Roots," her version of the sandwich is called "Elbow Lick Tomato Sandwich." Which, you must admit, is a great name. It takes at least two days just to make the bread. Another day may be devoted to finding a Cherokee Purple tomato. Those used to be reliably sold at our local farmers' market, but are scarce now. Then there's the smoked corn mayo: an outdoor grilling event followed by a blender event. She doesn't specify this, but I'm sure that when she calls for 2 eggs she means for you to go out to the coop and shove a chicken off its nest. After all, you can't charge $29 for Pepperidge Farm bread. But if you can make a sandwich with a ripe summer tomato, some decent fresh white bread and Duke's mayo and you end up licking your elbow you're there already. And if by the look on your face someones asks what you are smoking, tell them not corn.

Yes. My mother, who, despite living in Cincinnati until she ran away from home and adopted NY, and to whom the south was only endured because my grandmother lived in Miami, would have made the perfect tomato sandwich with vinaigrette instead of mayo. Then she would have picked out the tomato and tossed the bread.

But what does Barbie put on a tomato sandwich? Never mind. Where's Gabrielle Hamilton when you need her? She would know the RIGHT way to make a classic tomato sandwich. Actually I already know her answer: Hellman's, Pepperidge Farm white bread and a just-picked tomato from a Sicilian hillside garden. See directions for how to build. Slice the tomato 3/8 inches thick. Cut the slice in half moons. Then put the half moons back to make it look like whole slices. Bury the slices in mayo as if you were burying a body in a New Orleans cemetery: shallow, so you rise with the first heavenly bite. If you are going to use furikake on your sandwich, why waste your stash of Duke"s? Use Kewpie and then you only need a lousy supermarket tomato because you won't be able to taste it anyway. Hilarious topic. You gotta hand it to the NYT. Clearly a sizable number of readers spent a long time on that double page spread and got a lot of mileage out it, myself included.

Classic southern dinner last night. Shrimp n Grits: fat gulf shrimp with a light fresh sauce of cherry tomatoes, wine, shrimp stock. White grits just shipped from Marsh Hill Farm (used to be Geechie Boy). And from the farmers' market: okra dusted with cornmeal sautéed in butter. Finally padron peppers cooked on the grill. The peppers were flavorful, but many were too hot for me. We usually get shishitos, which are less meaty but seem to have a ratio of fewer hot ones. The few padrons that were mild were delicious, but once you get a hot one it's hard to appreciate the milder ones. I took tiny bites off the pointy ends to determine the heat level. If it was too hot I gave it to my husband, who seems to have developed a very high tolerance for hot stuff, while my tolerance has decreased over the years since I lived in NM. My memories of NM are very vivid and it's hard to believe I lived there so long ago in the 60's and the 70's. OMG I'm O.L.D.

Spoken like John McEnroe! Yes. Need a new take on an old standard? Add raisins. Or furikake. Or miso.Or rutabaga. Or radish greens.

My favorite summer dinner tonight! All from the farmers' market; really delicious corn on the cob, okra cooked on the barbie (not that Barbie!) and good early girls, sliced with olive oil, salt and pepper. Some kind of baby plums for dessert. Fool proof.

And why is that, do you think? Many recipes I see these days look like somebody spun a food wheel, blindfolded, and picked five ingredients to make a meal from.. Remember that thread about three ingredients that are weird together? If there was a contest to make a dish with all three Melissa Clark would win. Oh, wait, I didn't say it would be edible.

There's no doubt the tomato / mayo / white bread sandwich is a great one. One thing about Eric Kim, though, he has a knack for inventing the wheel. Again. A two page spread in the magazine just because he adds furikake? I totally agree that a great ripe tomato is essential, since there's basically nothing else going on. But good fresh bread is just as important. So yeah, timing is crucial. This sandwich, like the famous James Beard Vidalia onion sandwich is only made in our house the day my husband bakes a brioche or pullman loaf. Not to beat a dead horse, but Duke's mayo is the slather of choice for me.

Kill. Me. Now.

Dropping food on the flour is a great scientific experiment, dog or no dog. With no dog it's more of a learning experience as to how much your mother will tolerate picking it up. My daughter sent me a hilarious video of her twins: One was in a high chair. The other was on the floor just below, eating the stuff that was dropped. I have to say, these stories about our younger selves hiding unwanted food behind the fridge or in a drawer or behind the radiator are more sad that funny when you think about it. That any kid feels they should have to resort to such measures must make for a lot of anxiety.

I wish the same, if only because of all the fabulous food that would get made for me. When it came to my own daughter I had only to watch my brother's wife make meals for her boys. If they didn't like one, she would make a second meal. If they rejected that, she would make a third meal for them. They had her number. In their defense she was a dreadful cook and she and my brother were into a lot of peculiar "health foods." Would you try to get your three year old to eat an umeboshi plum? Only my brother would do such a thing. One of my nephews became a restaurateur and the other is the most fun person to cook for that I know. Well, okay, my husband comes close. Well, back to my daughter. When she hit three she wanted her room and her clothes to be pink. But she wanted her food to be white. Bread, noodles, rice, milk in various combinations. Nothing red, nothing green. Really, you've got to pick your battles, and food is a particularly unpleasant battle. So white food it was. Now she eats almost everything except coconut, which she claims made her sick when she was young. It didn't. She's 35 now and I'm positive she hasn't eaten anything coconut since that episode. And I'm sure she doesn't give her twins anything with coconut either. The "no food battles" policy was a good one. Her spaghetti had butter on it, ours had red sauce and green things on it. The main result of the coconut phobia was that I never learned how to make a coconut cake.

What a fabulously clever mom you are. Now she knows better than to get covid again! Sorry, I couldn't resist. Kids, grown or otherwise, should have whatever they want when they are sick. Even a pumpkin spice latte.

I misspoke. On second thought I think it's better to pour on the sympathy and say "Oh, I'm so sorry you don't like Coq au Vin. Can I make you a PB&J? We have some really good peanut butter!" After all I don't want my guests to think I'm not able to pivot.

Totally agree. Several years ago my neighborhood celebrated when we were able to keep Starbucks out of our block-long little shopping area. However, I admit that on a hot summer road trip when you spot a pathetic mall on the side of the freeway you can count on there being a Starbucks in there. An Espresso Frappuccino can be a life-saver. But I have absolutely no use for Howard Schultz.

The recipe is Creamed Spinach, from the NYT Kay Chun. The NYT has more than one recipe, but hers is the one I use. She adds a bit of sour cream at the end. I use creme fraiche, since I don't typically keep sour cream on hand. https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1022649-creamed-spinach

Exactly. An alternative reaction, and probably better for everyone's health would be to turn very chilly and suggest said ingrate make themself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. On the bright side, more leftovers for me.

I've spent a lifetime thinking that creamed spinach was an iffy proposition at best. The very few times I've had it were disappointing or just plain awful. Then a year or so ago I found a recipe that looked appealing so I actually made it myself. Wonder of wonders, it was great. And easy. Count me a convert. Thirty or so years ago I had a similar experience with meatloaf. I hated it until I learned how to make it my way. Mine isn't simple; it's labor intensive and kind of fussy. And it's one of the few things I can genuinely claim is my own recipe and not just something I tweaked, since I tweak almost everything. I haven't made it in years, mostly because I rarely eat beef any more and because I'm lazy. Making Coq au Vin for the first time was pretty exciting. I had a party dish! It became so routine that my husband now makes it instead of me. I wish I could say I've made a layer cake with frosting, because if I did I would be very proud of myself! Not gonna happen; not in my DNA. Just the idea of cutting a baked cake horizontally makes me run for the xanax. Applying frosting that doesn't look like a bad hair day sends me off for two xanax.

Me too. I wouldn't want any traces of the experiences left around to remind me.

I think pipian is typically make with pumpkin seeds. A pipian rojo would usually involve a hot dried red chile in some form. A romesco sauce is usually made with roasted tomatoes and red peppers that are milder, like a red bell or a piquillo; almonds are the most common nut for romesco, but the NYT has a recipe that uses almonds and hazelnuts. I find that most commercial or restaurant romesco sauce is too heavy on the red bell pepper taste. A good shortcut for making romesco might be to use a jarred roasted piquillo product like Matiz.

Yep, it's a classic. For a period of time the NYT published that recipe every year because it was so loved.

I'll say one thing about yellow summer squash: it's better than zucchini. There is a recipe Summer Squash Gratom all Juanita that I clipped several years ago but can't find online. It's simple and good and uses nothing more than yellow squash and tomatoes. First sauté an onion and/or shallots in olive oil, Add minced garlic and salt. Remove the mixture when the garlic is fragrant and coat the bottom of a gratin dish with it. Slice up 1.5 to 2 lbs medium size squash and arrange it in rows. Make in-between layers of about a pint of cherry tomatoes, halved. Press down and bake in the oven at 375 for about 45 minutes. Take out of the oven and cover the top with grated melty cheese like Oaxaca to taste. Switch the oven to broil and cook again very briefly til the cheese is melted. Additions are called for: fresh thyme and oregano is nice. Roasted green chile is good. Or chop up a fresh Jalapeño or serrano chile and add it to the onion/garlic sautée. I use about 5-6 medium yellow squashes, usually crookneck. I also don't see any reason to make neat rows. Mine are semi-organized, but I don't see what the harm would be in simply piling them all in together. Also I don't see why you can't use whatever firm but ripe tomatoes you have on hand, just cut in chunks. Surely there's plenty of room to improvise whenever you have summer squash and tomatoes. Use spices or herbs generously. We like this just as a side but sometimes make it a main meal by serving it with some version of Mexican red rice. Especially good if you use achiote paste to flavor the rice.

Yes, it's very sweet. When I cook for my family or guests I rarely take requests unless it's something that appeals to ME. On the subject of kale, it seems to me that if you have to boil the living daylights out of it you might as well make collards, instead. Although baby collards can be done like chard in a quick saute. The only type of kale I eat is Lacinato, in soups, but truthfully I often opt for chard there too. I don't know if it was really true kale, but there used to be a vendor at one of our farmers' markets who sold "Baby Russian Kale." It didn't look like kale at all, more like small oak leaves. It was tender and very good. I still am mystified by the kale fad. It is no more healthy than any other dark leafy green.

Maybe he knows his aunt has the best chance of making one that's edible?

I am happy to give you my opinion without even trying it! To each his/her/their own realm. The world of toast is very inclusive. I doubt I would like your toast. I find burnt toast to be be very sad, and cold toast to be British at best and criminal at worst. However, the next time we have an accidental carbon event I'll try and remember to wait until the offending slice is cold, then butter it, and then after one bite, throw it in the trash. Or give it to my husband who hates waste and loves a challenge. If, by some freakish stitch in time I enjoy it, I'll definitely let you know.

I wish I'd known how versatile a popcorn popper could be when I was in college in Wisconsin. When the heat went out in the dorm in winter I bought a funky old electric popper and took it apart to expose the coil. It worked to warm up the space beneath my desk. I'm guessing it was a dangerous fix, but it's too bad I didn't know I could scramble eggs with it as well.