Tomato Custard and Fall

Fall gets me crazy. So much to taste, so much to process, and so much beauty lost between our fingers as we try to save the bounty. We can't save much of it no matter how frantically we try, but surely it will come again. Oh if only we could feel confident that it would. In the mean time, it makes us feel so right with the world to put food up, even if it is only one batch of freezer jam.

In the spirit of  this fallness, beginning tomorrow and until tomatoes last, we will have not only BLTs but we will also have tomato custard  (thank you Jan) and panzanella (a bread tomato salad, thank you Mary). You haven’t had tomato custard? Then it is likely that you are not from the midwest and/or aren’t old enough to remember the cooking of someone born before the turn of the 20th century. Well, here is your chance to taste it. Beginning tomorrow until we run out of bread and tomatoes, we will have tomato custard. It is a simple mix of bread, tomatoes, and some sugar, oh and Butter!. It is savory, and just invites you to taste it again and again.

And then there are the PawPaws. There have been two "fallings" so far this year (Paw Paws cannot be picked, they must fall from the trees it they are to be able to ripen). Donna Tellum and her husband dutifully watch for them to fall, gather them before the deer and the squirrels get them, and deliver them to the bakery just so that you can enjoy them.  Let us thank Donna for the possibility to taste this "mango/banana" tasting local fruit. We sort them and ripen them and then spend great energy pulping them. Some of the fruits only yield a teaspoon or so of pulp as they have very large seeds. The best fruits yield about ¼ cup of pulp. 

We have Paw Paw croissants in the case every day until we don't. You must try them.