THE TOMATO

Everybody who knows me knows I love tomatoes.  I was raised on them.  More than that, I was raised hunting for the perfect tomato. It was as much sport as it was mission in my family, as competitive as SEC football.  And my dad was the coach, the master of the hunt.

We grew them, of course.  But we would also drive miles to some small make-shift stand by the side of some unmarked country road because my father had heard talk of the size, color and quality of some farmer’s tomatoes.

I never knew a time when my father didn’t have several red Beefsteaks lined up in his kitchen windowsill waiting for that very moment when one of them would be ready to slice.  He ate them with every meal, every day.

So no wonder Catherine Grace Cline, the young and witty heroine of my first book, believed that “the tomato was the symbol of a person’s God-fearing commitment to biblical and civic values.”  Her devotion to the tomato was in her blood, as it is in mine.

And even now, as a very grown woman, when the weather turns hot and the tomatoes start to ripen on the vine, I think of my daddy and the search for tomato perfection!

Some of my favorite heirlooms -- Valencia, Cherokee Purple and Pineapple.

Let me know where you find the perfect tomato!!!

Posted July 30, 2009 at 11:38 am · 4 comments