One Great . . . tomato sauce

The tomato season is winding down, but it's not over yet. Around here, we usually have tomatoes well into September.

My friends at the Washington Post held a contest recently for readers' best recipes using tomatoes. (Man, I hate those guys - such good stories.)

One of the finalist recipes was this handy little thing called Tomato Butter, sent in by Nan Fuhrman of Seneca, Md. She uses it as a cracker spread, but I bet you could a bunch of uses, including a sandwich spread.

Tomato Butter

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 large sweet onion, diced
2 pounds dark, pulpy tomatoes, stem ends sliced off and seeds squeezed out
1 teaspoon sweet Hungarian paprika
1 teaspoon light brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon liquid smoke

Heat the oil in a large, heavy skillet over medium heat. Add the onion and cook until translucent, about 5 minutes. Cover, reduce heat to medium-low and cook until the onion is soft, stirring a few times, about 10 minutes. Stir in tomatoes, paprika, brown sugar and salt. Cook, uncovered, until mixture thickens to the consistency of jam, stirring often and using a wooden spoon to break up large pieces of tomato, about 30 minutes.

Transfer to a blender. Remove center from blender jar and cover with a towel to contain splashes. Puree until smooth. Strain if desired, then stir in liquid smoke and blend again on low speed. Cool to room temperature and refrigerate. Keeps about a week, covered.

Makes about 1 cup.

How America Eats (And Argues About It)

In the discussion over how we eat (local, not local, cheap, expensive), there are a couple of good pieces in the news this week.


Newsweek's cover story looks at the divide between those who spend more on quality and those who have less to spend and make tough choices. The headline is a little misleading ("How Our Foodie Obsession Is Driving Americans Apart" isn't really the conclusion of the article). Lisa Miller's piece really shows more insight into the tough choices people have to make between quality and affordability.



Meanwhile, over at the Washington Post's opinion pages, writers Brent Cunningham of the Columbia Journalism Review and former Post food writer Jane Black weigh in on the food-culture wars and how food choices are becoming class divisions. Ironically, the Newsweek headline would be more appropriate on this one.



Taken together, they're both thought-provoking and the beginning of what is becoming a new way to define the choices we make about what -- and how -- we eat.