Tomatillos

Apparently the tomatillo was not a target of the late blight ravaging brandy wine, ugly, beefsteak, and other varieties of basic tomatoes. Actually a relative of the gooseberry family, but clearly a nightshade, it has appeared in our local Great Barrington markets.

I always loved the stews, often with pork, and salsas incorporating roasted tomatillo. The roasted tomatillo is sympathetic with the roasted red peppers done on my stove top. I made a wonderful recipe once with a 1" dice of pork and browned and throwing off a rich sauce, fennel 1/2's to hold the mixture, which incorporated tomatillo, while it baked in a moderate oven. I wish I could find that particular recipe in the house: I know it is printed and leaved in one of our cook books. Where o where? It might have been occasioned by a purchase from Snow's Farm in Sandisfield. A wonderful homestead farm nearby.

A morning hour spent separating them from the paper husk was grounding. The focus or meditation on ingredients supplies power to me whenever I cook. Without knowing I guess the paper husk may insulate the fruit from an intense sun in the lower lats. Some had yellowed last week when I scoured the (2) plants Karen had sheparded through the growing season. The tacky fruit coating is always tenacious but removes from the hands with a simple washing. They were left on a newspaper to dry and possibly will be cooked on Sunday morning.

The newspaper was a refreshing issue from this week, our daily Berkshire Eagle, entirely in black and white: no spot color. I hope it was an intentional choice: the B+W resonated with me. It reinforced my sense of the Walker Evans images filling my head as I read the current biography. I have spent some time, long, long ago, making pictures incorporating vegetables in images only as B+W. A different appreciation of the food unit.

I surely hope I can reconstruct the pork/tomatillo/fennel recipe.