Fried green tomatoes: not the film here!

[Gifted Gourmet]

When I was writing the Southeast Forum Digest this week, the lead article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution had southern fried green tomatoes as its focus .. which led me to think a bit more about this classic dish and its origins and how it has evolved over time.

Nowadays, one can find the very basic dish, enrobed in cornmeal and deep fried in bacon fat, but also in a very chic, upscale form, as in "Fried Green Tomatoes With Herbed Cheese and Roasted Red Pepper Coulis Over Jalapeño Cheese Grits ".. so have we come a long way baby here or simply found yet another dish which can be magically transformed into haute cuisine??

There are numerous ways to coat and fry your tomatoes; use bread crumbs, cracker crumbs, cornmeal, or flour. Some people dip them in beaten eggs before dredging, while some just dredge then fry.

If you live in the South, what are your recollections or thoughts on this dish? If you live elsewhere in these United States, is this something you might see on your menu in some variation on a theme?

[andiesenji]

Wow! Great Minds and all that........

I happened to be thinking about green tomatoes this morning, since I have a lot in the garden and thought I should do something with some of them.

I sliced one rather large flat one into two thick slices, grilled in on the panini grill then sandwiched them between ham and provolone on a large ciabatta roll, then put the entire thing into the grill and cooked it until the cheese was nicely melted.

That was my breakfast.

I love fried green tomatoes in any way, shape or form and, depending upon my mood, I dredge them in seasoned flour or flour/cornmeal mix - I have tried dipping in egg but didn't like the mess.

I have ground Mrs. Cubbison's cornbread stuffing (seasoned) in the food processor and dredged them in that when cooking for a crowd. (Some people do not care for the grittiness of the stone-ground cornmeal I use.)

I make green tomato hush puppies, chopping the tomatoes then adding just enough batter to hold it together and deep frying. My friends love these.

I layer slices of green tomato with slices of eggplant that have been brushed with roasted garlic oil, and slices of provolone and bake.

I also have a terrific recipe for green tomato pie.

There is a restaurant here in Lancaster, aptly named the Whistle Stop Cafe, owned by a transplanted Alabama couple. He came out her to work on the Space Shuttle program and when it ended he and his wife opened the restaurant. They serve fried green tomatoes and all the other southern foods you would expect.

[davebr]

Mine first experience was quite by accident. I was at a friends house for the weekend. They have 2 kitchens--one for the men and one for the women. I usually do all the cooking and we play cards, go skinny dipping, ect.... The hostess had gone out into the garden and picked some green tomatoes. Being in Natchitoches, I figured what the hell, fried green tomatoes--just like the movie they filmed here that I never saw( I'm too butch for something like that). We used breadcrumbs and I made a sauce with horseradish, mayo, L&P, tabasco and garlic. WONDERFULL.

A year later I made it a salad on my restaurant's menu with blue cheese, spinach spiced pecans and the horseradish dressing. It has been our biggest seller for the past 5 years--making it into Southern Living twice.

I have heard Ben Baker has a great green tomato soup at The Magnolia Grill in North Carolina. Has anyone tried it?

[Varmint]

I've had Ben's version of the soup and made it myself several times. Bacon and crabmeat work very well with the spicy soup. I also like to make fried green tomato "croutons" to add a little crunch to the top of the soup.

[fifi]

I am not a raw tomato eater, but I have always been intrigued with the concept of fried green tomatoes. I am going to try it. I am wondering if the same "oven frying" technique that I have used for eggplant for years would work or if there is too much water in the tomato.

Oven fried eggplant:

Whisk together thoroughly 1/4 cup cooking oil and one egg.

Dip 1/4 inch eggplant slices into the oil/egg mixture.

Dip into seasoned breadcrumbs of your choice.

On a baking sheet in a 375F oven, bake, turning once, for about 15 to 20 minutes per side.

Also works for summer squash like yellow or zucchini.

Worse than potato chips.

[Gifted Gourmet]

oven fried green tomatoes (as per your question)

[phaelon56]

I live in central NY state and was introduced to them by a former GF who lived in Alabama during her adolescence and learned to cook from "Big Mama". I was blown away when I tried them - just stunned at how good they were. I had tried pcikled green tomatoes and was underwhelmed but in the fried form they are a revelation. She made them about 1/4" thick with cornmeal.

Fast forward to recently - I was visiting my new GF in Charlotte, where she had relocated from NJ. We were getting some takeout from the Chicken Box (I think that's the name - it's on North Tryon about two miles north of Uptown). They had them on the menu and we got an order - a bit greasy but still delicious - also cut thin. What shocked me was that my current GF had never tried them before but she grew up in Memphis. Are they typically just popular further south?

In the north.... I have had them at Maroon's Restaurant in Chelsea (NYC). Their menu is Jamaican and American Southern. Theirs are thick cut - probably close to 3/4 " and very light without a trace of visible oil - very good. Dinosaur BBQ in Syracuse NY and Rochester now has them on the menu as well (soon in NYC when they finally get that branch open. Theirs are about 1/2" thick and done with a cajun spiced cornmeal and served with a seasoned mayonnaise/dressing that seems lieklk a cross between ranch dressing and remoulade. Great dish - the best rendition of this that I've ever tried. They also sprinkle them with grated cheese (I think it's parmesan or romano) which is totally superfluous.

Dinosaur BBQ Fried Green Tomatoes

[FL Heat]

What shocked me was that my current GF had never tried them before but she grew up in Memphis. Are they typically just popular further south?

I think they tend to be thought of as a "rural" food. The first time I had them was on my Papaw's farm, with green tomatoes from their kitchen garden. My friends (I grew up in the Dallas area) were a little snooty about foods like fried green tomatoes, collard greens, and fried chicken. Those were considered "country food".

It's completely possible to grow up someplace like Dallas, Houston, Memphis, Atlanta, or other good-sized cities and never encounter the rural South's culture and foods.

As for just being popular further south, on a recent trip to rural Illinois, the family we visited looooved fried green tomatoes.

Those are just my experiences

Diana

[phaelon56]

Keep in mind the context. My GF grew up eating squirrel, opossum, collards, beans and the like. Fried chicken was only on the occasions that they could afford that luxury. To this day she won't eat any kind of game and I can't say that I blame her. She still loves greens though and despite being content to let me doo nearly all the cooking, when we have greens she has to fix them (although she finally admitted that mine are pretty damn good). She was raised in Memphis but it was southern and not particularly urban - her upbringing was not citified in the way we think of it here in the Northeast. It wasn't really rural either (her stepfather drove out to the country to shoot the aforementioned game).

[therese]

Grew up in a combination of the south and midwest, with summers spent on the very rural farm of my grandparents in southwest Virginia, high school in Kentucky, college in Virginia, graduate school and professional life in Atlanta. Lots of eating in private homes and all sorts of restaurants all those years.

I'd never even heard of fried green tomatoes until the movie came out, and I've only ever eaten them in semi-upmarket places in Atlanta and Charleston (which cater largely to non-locals). They've been okay, but not amazing.

In any case, not so widely available in the past as they seem to be now.

[Lan4Dawg]

I grew up in Georgia and even through count less camp meetings, church socials, receptions, "all-day preaching/singing & dinner-on-the-grounds, revivials, family re-unions, &c I seldomly remember fried green tomatoes. There were almost always fresh, ripe, peeled tomatoes some where on the table but never green tomatoes. The only time we ever got fried green tomatoes was in the fall when the frost was about to hit and every one knew that they would lose those tomatoes on the vine and had to do some thing w/ them. Then you would pick the green tomatoes and pickle them or fry them or make a green tomato casserole or some thing w/ them just to use them before the cold got to them.

In the summer months you did not dare pick a tomato before it ripened b/c the finished product was just too good.

[therese]

Yeah. My grandmother was much more of a pickler than a fryer. The only thing she ever fried was chicken.

[Mayhaw Man]

Keep in in the context. My GF grew up eating squirrel, opossum, collards, beans and the like.

I regularly eat all of that stuff (except possum-ever seen a skinned possum?looks just like a cat-yuck-they are as dry and lean as toast-kind of like giant rats ).

Squirrells are damn tasty, although kind of a pain because even a fat one is pretty lean. Had turnip greens last night (although during the summer the greens tend to lean towards bitter-somehow related to the heat-they are much better in the wintertime).

Squirrel Suace Piquant is fine dining down here in my neck of the woods.

[BrentKulman]

I had fried green tomatoes frequently as a child in the 1960s. Based purely on my family experience, my hunch is that this dish was a staple of what is now called "soul food" in the Central Virginia piedmont. I have no idea how widespread geographically the dish was served but I suspect that it would be found at least throughout the mid-south, wherever fried foods were an important part of the diet.

One thing I do recall was that our tomatoes were fried in a combination of flour and cornmeal until they were quite limp, unlike the firmer versions that are typically served these days in restaurants. It takes considerable skill with a frying pan to achieve a softer consistency without burning the tomatoes. I now wonder whether this was a personal preference of the cook or a regional variation of the dish.

[andiesenji]

I grew up in western Kentucky and we certainly had plenty of green tomato dishes. Fried green tomatoes were just one of them.

Green tomato jam (or marmalade), which was made almost like the filling for green tomato pie, was a favorite tea-time treat with biscuits or scones. A spicy version was served with meats.

Unless one grows their own, out here it is very difficult to find green tomatoes. Some of the specialty groceries carry them or will get them as a special order if they go to the central produce market themselves.

Back home there are almost always green tomatoes displayed right alongside the ripe tomatoes in many stores. The last time I was in Arkansas I took a friend to the store with me after a day of dog-showing (Fort Smith). He was amazed at the varieties of produce displayed. Much different than southern California. Fewer exotics, more "down home" stuff.

I did buy green tomatoes and made fried green tomatoes for dinner that night. As I recalled we had about 15 people at the cook-out. (I had a motorhome that had a really complete kitchen and usually caravaned with other folks with motorhomes and we would set up together for mutual help).

I had a lot of fun introducing people to regional favorites.

[joiei]

when I used to live in Destin, Fl one restaurant started serving fried green tomatoes topped with crabmeat and a roasted bell pepper cream. They were great. But I do not remember eating fried green tomatoes when growing up on the Northwest Florida coast during the 50s and 60s. The first time I ever remember eating this dish was when I was 8 and visiting my aunt and uncle who lived in Granite City, Illinois. It must be something from the upper southern regions as best as I have discerned from this thread.

[oneidaone]

Aloha!!!!!!Every Saturday morning at the farmer's market at Kapiolani Community College there is a stand that serves fried green tomatoes with 2 sauces my favorite is the wasabi aioli, there is a panko crust and these snacks are just so tasty and make a great breakfast while shopping. Hauula

tomatoes are used, they are grown here on the windward side and the taste can't be beat.

A hui ho!!!!!!!

[bavila]

My parents flew in from Louisiana last night with half a dozen green tomatoes from their garden. My dad lamented, "You'll just have to force ripen them." And I said, "No way, I want to fry those puppies!"

I don't, however, have a foolproof method or recipe. When I've made them in the past, it seems the batter doesn't want to stick (that was a cornmeal batter I believe), and the tomatoes are either too mushy or too hard.

Does anyone have the ultimate fried green tomatoes receipt? I'd love to reproduce the Upperline (New Orleans) version with shrimp remoulade. Any insiders' secrets?

[DTBarton]

Here's an Upperline primer: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5692200

I agree with their egg wash and dip method as opposed to batter, just because that's how I do it. My only other tip is I've had better luck with slightly thicker slices of tomato.

[annecros]

Looks like a great recipe! I think I would coat in AP flour before hitting the eggwash though. The flour makes the eggwash stick, that makes the cornmeal stick.

You should have sort of a Shnitzel like finish on the outside when done. That is, you have a solid coating that you can separate with the point of a knife between that cooked tomato and the coating.

Pickled green tomatoes are pretty good as well. Just another option. Also, great in an omelette.

[bavila]

You rock, DTBarton! I suppose a google search might have turned that up for me, but I will add this to my list of lamentations about not having a lifestyle that supports listening to NPR.

I'd still love to read more...Mayhaw Man? Varmint? Phlawless? You out there? Hell, Chufi's probably ventured into Fannie Flagg-dom too.

I must also consider who is green tomato-worthy as they will still be in short supply locally for a few months....