Future
Five Weeknight Tomato Dishes
Put summer’s crown jewel to work in a simple meatball pan sauce, a luxurious tangle of garlicky pasta or a beloved dumpling salad.
Let’s get something out of the way: The best way to eat a summer tomato is to just eat it, thickly sliced and lightly showered with salt.
That’s what I’m doing with those fat beefsteaks and heirlooms, so juicy that they nearly collapse into a mosaic of seeds and pulp on the cutting board. You can riff on that basic formula — ripe tomatoes plus salt — by adding cucumber, watermelon, peaches or mozzarella for salads, or layering them on toast for something like pan con tomate, or sandwiching them with bacon for a lush BLT with smoky crunch.
But if you’re going to eat tomatoes at just about every meal — very much my intention for the month of August — you should change up the repertoire a bit. I want recipes that put tomatoes to work, leveraging their distinct sweetness and acidic ping.
Here are five tomato dinners that do just that, by grating or dicing them, roasting them, lightly sautéing them or simply cutting them up and drizzling them with a sparky vinaigrette. (Not a tomato eater? Here’s a collection of more than 100 easy summer dinner recipes.)
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Credit…Julia Gartland for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Samantha Seneviratne.
