Home › Meat Substitutes › Sliced Tomatoes
Sliced Tomatoes
Put tomatoes in a bowl and pour boiling water over them, let them stand one minute, then peel off the skins. Chill thoroughly, and cut in slices. Serve with oil, vinegar, pepper and salt, and sugar if desired.
A three-line recipe whose success rests entirely on the tomatoes and on not letting the boiling water cook them. A few points on handling.
- Blanch briefly, not a full minuteA minute in boiling water is enough to soften the outer flesh of a ripe summer tomato and leave the slices weepy. Fifteen to thirty seconds is usually enough for the skin to split at the stem end; lift them out the moment it does and drop them into ice water.
- An alternative to blanchingIf the tomatoes are firm, a serrated peeler or a sharp paring knife removes the skin with no heat at all and no loss of texture. Whether to peel is a matter of taste rather than necessity.
- Chill thoroughly means chillThe instruction is doing real work: warm peeled tomatoes go slack and release juice into the dressing. An hour in the refrigerator, uncovered on a plate, firms them and lets surface moisture dry off.
- Slice with a thin bladePeeled tomatoes are slippery. A thin, very sharp knife, and slices about a quarter-inch thick, will hold their shape on the plate; thicker rounds slide apart under the dressing.
- Dressing proportionsThe recipe gives no ratio. Three parts oil to one part vinegar is the conventional starting point; with sweet ripe tomatoes a little more oil in proportion can suit better. Cider or wine vinegar suits this better than distilled white.
- Salt at the last momentSalt pulls water out of cut tomatoes within a few minutes. Dress and season immediately before the plate goes to the table; the original's wording would also allow the oil, vinegar and seasonings to be offered separately.
- The sugarThe optional sugar is there for underripe or acidic fruit. With good ripe tomatoes it can be left out entirely.
- YieldReckon one medium tomato per person as a side salad, two if it is standing in as the substantial part of a light meal.
Books titled along the lines of Meatless Cookery proliferated in the English-speaking world in the years around the First World War, when meat conservation was both a household economy and a patriotic campaign, and when vegetarianism was gaining a following on health and moral grounds. The blanch-and-peel method is older than the book.