Fried Green Tomatoes Time Again

One of our neighbors sent out an email inviting us to help ourselves to the last of her garden produce that she had set on her porch. Her garden is finished for this year. I picked up some nice little cherry tomatoes and 2 green tomatoes. I fried the green tomatoes for lunch today, halving the recipe I used last year. The amount was just right for two people.

 

I picked up my x-ray films today from the hospital as I had been instructed to drop them off before my appointment tomorrow with the orthopedist. The receptionist said I could have just brought them with me tomorrow, I didn’t need to make an extra trip. However, it turned out that the doctor was in the office unexpectedly because he needed to see someone who they were unable to fit into tomorrow’s schedule. She said if I had time I could wait and see him today. He examined my foot and definitely found the area of pain. He injected the area with cortisone (boy did that hurt!) and now I am wearing a bigger boot for two weeks. One of my church friends who had ankle/foot surgery just graduated last week from casts to a boot. I guess I had boot envy.

 Since it is my driving foot (right foot), I don’t think I will be going many places the next 2 weeks unless my husband drives me. The boot sort of rocks you back on your heel so that the rest of the foot isn’t bearing weight. I will take it off to shower and at bedtime. It will be 2-3 days before the cortisone has any effect, if any. Right now my foot is sore from the shot. The doctor thinks there is inflammation, thus the cortisone. The area injected is around the os peroneum. I had never heard of it, but he showed it to me on the x-ray. Not everybody has this little “accesory bone/cartilage”.

I had thought about having a doctor look at my foot after two months of pain, but I was afraid that I might end up with one of these boots; it would have been impossible to visit Quebec City with a boot on. Unfortunately, when I did return home, it took several weeks to get in to see my primary care doctor. She is the one that had me wear the post-op shoe. I will say that it was only a 4 day wait (turned out to be only 3 days) to see the orthopedist. The referral went fast. If no improvement in 2 weeks, an MRI will be scheduled when/if the insurance company authorizes it. Just call me Hobble Along Cassidy.

Fried Green Tomatoes

The fried green tomatoes came out pretty well. Having lived in Texas for 2 decades, I know cornmeal is part of “authentic” fried green tomatoes. However, since this was an unplanned addition to our meal due to God’s bounty thru generous gardeners, I had to adapt the recipe using whatever I had on hand. Instead of bread crumbs and cornmeal, I used some Kroger Private Selection parmesan herbed panko crumbs I had bought on sale recently to try on baked tilapia.

I did see some other recipes using panko when I searched again, but I stuck with the original recipe I had printed from the internet, but substituted the panko crumbs for the cornmeal and bread crumbs.  I did follow some tips from other recipes such as salting the slices about 20 minutes before cooking them in order to draw out the moisture to have crispier results. I also sprinkled a little sugar on the slices at the same time as a few people suggested that the green tomatoes could be rather tart. I filled a non-stick skillet with about 1/4 inch of oil. Many recipes suggested much more oil or even deep fat frying.

I should have halved the recipe though. Way too many fried slices for two people to eat. I wrapped the leftovers in foil and will try reheating them Sunday morning to have with our scrambled eggs, but I suspect they will be soggy. The only other thing I would do differently would be to put the flour on a sheet of waxed paper and likewise the crumb mixture. Too many dirty plates otherwise.

 

Recipe:

4 large green tomatoes             1/2 cup bread crumbs

2 eggs                                             2 teaspoons coarse kosher salt

1/2 cup milk                                  1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

1 cup all-purpose flour                1 quart vegetable oil for frying

1/2 cup cornmeal

 

Slice tomatoes 1/2 inch thick. Discard ends.

Whisk eggs and milk together in a medium-sized bowl. Scoop flour onto a plate. Mix cornmeal, bread crumbs, and salt and pepper on another plate. Dip tomatoes into flour to coat. Then dip the tomatoes into the milk and egg mixture. Dredge in breadcrumbs to completely coat.

In a large skillet, pour vegetable oil (enough so there is 1/2 inch of oil in pan) and heat over medium heat. Place tomatoes into the frying pan in batches of 4 or 5, depending on skillet size. Do not crowd the tomatoes; they should not touch each other. When the tomatoes are browned, flip and fry the other side. Drain on paper towels and serve hot.

A Walk In the Woods

My husband bought a trail bike about 6 weeks ago. He heads out from our house thru some trees and college cross-country running trails, crosses Pierceton Road, and then enters the world of Winona Lake trail biking. You can see the trail layout and interesting names on this map. It is a pretty extensive system. Today he wanted me to walk some of the paths with him so I could see what he enjoys so much early mornings. He has a more solitary experience than we had today and often sees deer. Lots of people out in the near-perfect weather of 74 degrees this afternoon. A few of the colorful names are not on the map such as Privy Point and Puke Point but there is signage to that effect.

 

I especially liked the first part of the walk as we traveled alongside part of Cherry Creek. Leaves floated down on the gentle breeze and carpeted the forest. As we started out, we saw a downy woodpecker on a tree trunk. I have missed those since moving to our condo. At our former house, there were several dying and decaying trees which attracted them and other woodpeckers and flickers.

 

 

The trees are still wearing the fall foliage. My little point-and-shoot camera doesn’t do them justice.

 

I had my husband drop me off at the congregant housing part of the retirement village. I wanted to photograph the beautiful mums there. A few peppers and tomatoes in the garden. In the dining room the gardening club puts out produce to share. Mostly green tomatoes today. I picked up a few and I am going to try making fried green tomatoes tomorrow for lunch. I have never tried making those; we did enjoy some in a restaurant in Asheville, North Carolina many years ago. I picked a recipe from the internet. What has been your experience with fried green tomatoes? Any recipe suggestions or tips? I’ll let you know how they turn out.

Tomorrow the temps are expected to plunge into the 50s for the daytime. Fried green tomatoes might go well with chicken noodle soup and chocolate chip cookies.