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Broiled Tomatoes
Carefully remove the skin from some good sound tomatoes, and to facilitate this they should be placed for a short time in boiling water, cut them across in two, seasoning with a little salt and pour some oil over. Next put them on a hinged double broiler and broil them over a slow fire, basting them at frequent intervals with oil. When done dress them on a hot dish.
A plain gridiron dish from Oscar Tschirky's Waldorf kitchen, written for a cook who already knows how to manage a coal fire. The whole thing turns on gentle heat and constant basting.
- Peel first, and brieflyScore the base, drop the tomatoes into boiling water for 15-30 seconds, then into cold water. Longer and the flesh under the skin starts to cook and the halves collapse on the grill.
- Choose firm fruit"Good sound tomatoes" means unblemished, unbruised fruit; in practice firm, not over-ripe ones will serve best. Peeled soft tomatoes will not survive being turned in a hinged broiler; medium plum or round tomatoes hold together best.
- A slow fireOver charcoal or gas this is the cooler edge of the grate, roughly medium-low, with the fruit six to eight inches off the heat. Ten to fifteen minutes gets the cut faces browned without bursting them. High heat blisters the outside and leaves them raw and watery inside.
- The hinged double broilerA wire cage on a long handle that clamps the food between two grids so it can be flipped in one motion. A fish grilling basket does the same job; failing that, cook them cut side down on an oiled grate and turn once with a wide spatula.
- Basting is the pointSkinned tomatoes dry out fast. Brush with oil every couple of minutes, or the exposed flesh leathers before the centre softens.
- Oil, and seasoningMost likely olive oil, though the text says only "oil". Salt the cut faces a few minutes ahead and blot the drawn liquid before oiling, so the oil clings rather than sliding off. The recipe seasons with salt alone; pepper, if wanted, at the table.
- Under a broiler insteadIf no grill is available, arrange the halves cut side up on an oiled sheet and cook under the oven broiler on a low rack, basting as above. Not identical, but closer than a hot oven.
- Yield and serviceTwo halves per person as a garnish for a steak or chop, four as a vegetable course. Serve on a warmed dish immediately; they weep and cool within minutes.
Oscar Tschirky was not a chef but the Waldorf's maître d'hôtel, and the 1896 Cook Book by "Oscar" of the Waldorf collects the hotel's working repertoire in the same clipped, assumed-competence style used across the professional kitchens of the day. Broiled tomatoes belonged to the standard American grill card: a plate of chops or a porterhouse arrived with a broiled tomato, broiled mushrooms, or both, all cooked on the same gridiron over the same fire. The double broiler he calls for was ordinary equipment in a coal-fired range kitchen, where meat was turned over open bars rather than set in an oven. Tomatoes themselves were thoroughly domesticated in American cooking by the 1890s, appearing on hotel menus stewed, baked, stuffed, and, as here, simply peeled and grilled in oil.