Fried Green Tomatoes

I’ve been lamenting my tomato crop since August. Heirloom seeds my neighbor shared with me last Spring sprouted within days and shot up quickly once transplanted into vegetable beds. After a month or so, I had pretty yellow flowers and tiny green tomatoes forming on almost a dozen plants. It seemed promising.

By July, farmers markets overflowed with juicy ripe tomatoes of every variety and still I waited for mine to show any sign of readiness. I waited through August and September, but by October I had lost hope. Even in my sunny Potrero Hill garden, the heirloom tomatoes grew no larger then a tiny cherry and remained green through the season. The unripened crop dangled pathetically on the vine till November.

Plans for growing winter vegetables finally gave me the desire to pull up my failed tomato plants and I placed the last 30 or 40 tiny green tomatoes in a jar. What to do with these little things? There weren’t enough of them to pickle, and they were a little too bitter to make into green salsa.

After some hesitation (these weren’t going to be pretty) I chose to fry them. After all of my griping over green tomatoes, I have to admit, watching the batter turn golden brown and then adding the little delights into homemade spring rolls was almost as satisfying as plucking ripe red heirlooms of the vine.