PHOTO - Dinner is served! Tonight, fusilli with home made meat sauce

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Sauce: Tomatoes, extra virgin olive oil, ground beef, sliced black olives, onion, garlic, fresh basil, oregano, salt, black pepper.

:toast:

[JohnnyLib2]

1. Now, what's your address again?

:loveya:

[MiddleFingerMom]

2. That looks DELICIOUS!!! Every once in a while, I'll treat myself...

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...to a caprese salad -- just fresh mozzarella, tomatoes, balsamic vinegar, and fresh basil.
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It's been a long, LONG time since I've had fresh basil on hand, so have
omitted it and convinced myself that ingredient was no big deal.
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I made it the other night, had some fresh basil and snipped it up and
sprinkled it over the salad and realized what an integral and necessary
ingredient it really is.
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YUM!!!
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[Amerigo Vespucci]

5. Here's a photo of Caprese I took for one of my clients' Websites...

...the most appetizing thing, I remember, was the TOAST...it was the most perfect shade of uniform golden brown. I took a full range of photos from the menu that day but told the client "THIS is the single most artistic dish on your menu, because it is beautiful in its simplicity."



:toast:

[Gormy Cuss]

7. Ugh. Those tomatoes are too pink and pale.

Good tomatoes with that toast would make the dish sell by the gross.

I know that restaurants are somewhat constrained by their suppliers but it boggles my mind that even in the heart of local tomato season so many restaurants are using tasteless, watermelon-textured tomatoes.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

8. I don't think I've ever had a good local tomato in Silicon Valley...

...there are produce stands & weekend farmers markets all over the place but I somehow never find the time to go to them. When I make sauce I always buy the canned San Marzano tomatoes (world's best)...Safeway occasionally has the "hothouse" tomatoes, which taste more like a "real" tomato, but they're not cheap.

[Kali]

9. get cherry or grape tomatoes

if you have to buy from a store and money is not real important - they almost always taste like real tomatoes compared to the big ones - even the romas and "on the vines"

[Amerigo Vespucci]

11. Romas from chain markets are uniformly terrible...

...the "on the vines" are the hothouse tomatoes I was referring to and are a notch up, but not as good as you want them to be. You're right about the cherry tomatoes...they generally have a much better flavor. I bought grape tomatoes once for a salad, when I had company coming over, and my guests raved about them.

[MiddleFingerMom]

13. I agree with Kali...

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...the best tomatoes I get from a chain store seem to be the grape tomatoes.
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MAYBE I'd have much better luck with heirloom tomatoes, but I can't afford them.
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Another thing -- I think caprese salad calls for olive oil -- I like substituting
balsamic vinegar for that... and I think it improves the dish 1000%!!!
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And definitely get fresh mozzarella -- the little balls are fine -- or larger portions
for slicing.
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[lillypaddle]

16. Compari Tomatoes

are the best, not cheap, but worth every cent.

[Gormy Cuss]

10. There are farmers markets all over the area albeit not always on the most convenient days or times

but I get San Joaquin valley tomatoes at my local farmers market starting in late April or early May and by now there are so many beautiful tomatoes to choose from that it's an embarrassment of riches.

San Marzano type tomatoes are great, fresh or canned. I grow them and about a dozen other varieties just to ensure that I have a good supply from July through December.

I don't know how restaurants could incorporate good tomatoes. It's one of those things that seems really off in summer. Winter, those pale pink things start looking pretty good. :D

[CaliforniaPeggy]

3. My dear Amerigo Vespucci!

Oh, WOW!

And even though I just finished dinner, I must say this looks wonderful!:9

You do amazing work with your camera...

:toast:

[zabet]

4. Is that

my plate? :D

[applegrove]

6. Yummy. That is it! I'm cooking pasta this week.

[pokerfan]

12. It was a million to one shot, doc!

[Amerigo Vespucci]

15. I thought about "Fusilli Jerry" when I posted...

...the fusilli I used in this dish is a different kind, one that I have to get at a special market (Cosentino's, the only one in the area that has it). If you buy "fusilli" at Safeway, Lucky, etc, it's the 1 to 2 inch pasta as in the "Fusilli Jerry" photo.

The stuff I used is from an importer in Oakland, and it's an Italian brand called "Rustichella D'abruzzo" ( http://www.rustichella.it/English/home_eng.html ) and it's "Fusilli col buco." A 17.6 ounce package costs SEVEN BUCKS!

But I love it, and it's ideal for heartier sauces. Each piece of pasta is 16 inches long (!), folded in half to 8 inches:

[proteus_lives]

14. Looks yummy.

That beats the hell of my microwaved tv-dinner.

[whistler162]

17. Thought you meant this Fucillo....

Now that would be a big meal!