Still Life with a Tomato

I have to confess, I do not actually like the end of August. I would like to. I would love to savor the last lazy days of summer with bar-b-ques, and picnics, late evening walks, and the occasional trip to the beach. But the reality is that it is hot, and dry, and we are just too damn busy to do any of those things. The reality is that all we are really doing is waiting for the start of school, and the beginning of fall, which is all of things that late summer tries to be and fails.

However, the one thing that late summer does have, that no other season can lay claim to, which makes up for many other shortcomings, is vegetables. Late summer has homegrown, fresh from the garden vegetables, and more specifically, tomatoes, which are my all time, favorite food, barring nothing.

I put them in everything, and they make everything taste wonderful.

Soon, when the warm season is just ending, and the cool season is just beginning, I will will go out to the U-pick farm and pick boxes of tomatoes. I will bring them home and spend the whole day in the kitchen with jars, and hot water, and I will have jars and jars of homegrown tomatoes ready for spaghetti and soup in the dead of winter. Then I will roast sauce tomatoes in olive oil and garlic for hours in the oven until they are sticky and sweet, and we will be ready for fall.