Homegrown Tomatoes

Posts Tagged ‘Green Tomatoes’

The first time I ever had green tomato pie was almost my last.  More accurately, I never would have tried a piece if I had known it was made from green tomatoes.  How I would have lost out! 

Since then I have tried a few different recipes, with varying results.  But this week I’ve had to rescue a bunch of green tomatoes, so I figured it was high time for another go at making a green tomato pie.

And this was really yummy!  I started out with the same basic recipe I normally use, then added a few twists. 

So here’s my green tomato pie recipe — hope you enjoy it!

Gail’s Green Tomato Pie

• 2 deep-dish pie crusts (I buy ready-made, but you can make your own.)
• 1 medium to large Granny Smith apple
• 2 green tomatoes, roughly 6 to 8 ounces each
• 12 large strawberries
• 1 cup sugar (I used table sugar, but you can substitute brown sugar if you like)
• 1/2 cup flour
• Scant 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons butter

Prepare pie crusts.  If you use the ready-made frozen, let them defrost.  If you’re making your own, make enough for 2 deep-dish crusts.  You’ll be using 1 crust for the pie itself, and 1 crust for the top.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Mix the flour, sugar and salt in a small bowl.  Spoon it around to mix thoroughly.  Sprinkle several spoonfuls on the bottom of the crust you’re using for the pie.

Peel the apple, quarter and core.  Slice apple and layer on the bottom of the pie crust.  Sprinkle with a couple of spoons of the sugar/flour mix.

Slice up one one of the green tomatoes into fairly thin pieces and layer on top of the apples.  Sprinkle with the flour/sugar mix and dot with a tablespoon of butter.

Slice the strawberries and layer over the green tomatoes.  Sprinkle with more flour/sugar mix.

Slice up the other green tomato and layer over the strawberries.  Sprinkle with the rest of the flour/sugar mix and dot with the remaining butter.

Put the other crust over the top of the pie and squeeze the edges to seal.  Poke the top with a fork or knife for vent holes.

This ends up being a pretty juicy pie while it’s baking, so I like to grab a cookie sheet and line it with some foil before putting the pie on top of it and placeing in the oven (saves on oven clean-up).

Bake in 350 degree oven for about 50-55 minutes.

Let cool, then cut into wedges and serve with some whipped cream or ice cream.  Serves 8, and I don’t even want to guess the calories or whatnot.

Green Tomato Pie Notes

You can play around with this recipe some. You can cut the sugar back to 3/4 cups, and you can substitute other fruits for the strawberries.  The next time I make it, I’m going to try crushed pineapple.  If you choose to try that, make sure the pineapple is very well drained.

I don’t think it will matter much what kind of flour you use; I used white bread flour.  And next time, I’m going to try some white whole wheat flour, just to see what it’s like.

Interestingly enough, one of the green tomatoes I picked was actually starting to ripen in the center, so I got a really neat color effect.  While I wouldn’t choose a ripe tomato for this pie (too juicy and probably mushy), a tomato just starting to blush might be interesting to use.

At any rate, I hope you try and enjoy this recipe!

I went out a little while ago to check on the tomato plants. The weather has been quite unsettled lately, so I wanted to check and make sure everyone was doing OK.

I brought my camera out with me, and I shot a few pictures of a few of my tomatoes-to-be. Some are (I think) getting ready to ripen, others are “newborn”. Normally I would have had something ready to eat by now, but we’ve had a colder than normal winter so far. And when the weather is cooler, the slower the tomatoes mature.

Celebrity is the first of the tomatoes I got my photo op with. It’s actually Bush Celebrity, but has been acting a little more like an indeterminate of late; guess it’s due to the weather. The tomato in the photo gets a bit larger each day, and I know one day it will be ready to pluck. Nice shape, though, and blemish-free.

Next up is Husky Red Cherry. The two tomatoes in the photo have looked like this for the last month now; no size change. It’s only been in the last day or two that I think the color has barely started to change — it’s not quite so green as it had been. Lots of tiny new cherry tomatoes, but these two are the closest to being grown. If they don’t do anything soon, I may consider a doll-sized green tomato pie…

Patio has finally quit growing (the tomato that is) and so I’m waiting for it to start changing colors. Then again, it may (again) just be the weather. This particular plant has been less than generous with its flowers and fruits, although I am seeing a bunch of new flowers just starting to be formed.

The last for the day is the newborn Tigerella tomato. Just about the size of a blueberry, it’s the first one on this heirloom tomato plant. Lots more blooms, though, so hopefully production will start ramping up.

Like I said, with the weather unsettled, the tomatoes aren’t at their best. I’ve even had to bring in most of the seedlings that I had been hardening off, to wait for better weather. Well, growing tomatoes in South Florida in the winter isn’t a whole lot different from growing in the spring further north. At least, not this year.