Three Things
Bright, flavorful summer cooking, pan con tomate, book recs from a debut novelist
Greeting friends and well, it’s been an exciting weekend. There was not one bluebird spotting but two, and only a few hours after I watched a downy woodpecker do its little dance up the side of a maple tree while I enjoyed my morning iced coffee. Here are Three Things I’d like to tell you about this week.
1. Cured Fish + Pickled Fruit, a Perfect Pairing
New technique alert! All year long I look forward to RIGHT NOW, not just because most of the market MVPs are in season, but because the anchor of my dinner can be a simple piece of fresh fish on the grill. Ten minutes. So good. No clean-up. But the other day — please don’t accuse me of being a summer ingrate here — I thought to myself, maybe there is another easy, fresh way to prepare this beautiful steelhead trout fillet that I picked up at the farm store? Perhaps it’s not so shocking that I found my answer in the pages of Our South, written by Ashleigh Shanti, whose long, award-laden resume includes running the popular Good Hot Fish in Asheville. Our South is a deeply nuanced exploration of Black influence on various micro-regions of the South — and in the Backcountry chapter, she recalls learning an appreciation for preservation techniques as a way to prepare for cold Appalachian winters.
I immediately zeroed in on her Vinegar-Cured Trout with Pickled Fruit where she deploys a a quick salt-sugar cure in the fridge. That, plus a light swim in vinegar, lends the trout a sushi-like texture, the perfect pairing with the puckery still-crisp fruit. (Shanti calls for apples, I only had peaches — and also, it’s August!) Here is the recipe, reprinted with permission.
If you can’t find trout, I’d recommend using thin fillets of salmon or char.
P.S. Last summer’s Grilled Fish Bowls with Pickled Veg.
2. What’s for Lunch? Pan Con Tomate!
Anyone who has been around here long enough could probably set their watch to it: Tomato Sandwich Season, the time of year when Jenny gets all purist and poetic about the DALS tried-and-true, a thick-cut heirloom atop lightly mayo’d toasted country white bread, sprinkled with sea salt. In August, it’s what’s for lunch every. single. day. That is happening, I swear, but you know what’s kinda creeping into old-school tomato sandwich territory? Pan con tomate, Spanish tomato bread, which of course is even more old-school, but seems to be having a new-school moment, at least if we are to believe our social feeds. Here’s how I made these beauties you’re looking at above.
Pan Con Tomate
Halve your best heirloom tomato horizontally, “at the waist.” Place a box grater inside a medium mixing bowl. Rub the cut-side of the tomato against the side of the grater with the largest grates. The tomato’s skin should naturally fold away as you get to the bottom of each half. If the tomatoes in the bowl seem more liquidy than pulpy, strain the pulp through a fine mesh strainer. Stir 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil into the pulp and add some kosher salt.
Meanwhile, heat a tablespoon or two of olive oil in a cast iron or nonstick skillet over medium heat. When the pan is hot, add baguette halves and toast until they are golden brown, about 3-4 minutes. Remove from the skillet and immediately rub with the cut-side of a halved garlic clove. Top garlicky toasts with tomato pulp, a little more olive oil and a sprinkle of kosher or sea salt.
3. What the Writers are Reading: Anna Nordberg
I’m so happy to introduce you to the next superstar in my “What the Writers are Reading” series: Anna Nordberg, one of my trusted inner-circle book advisers, longtime magazine writer, and most important for today’s purposes, author of the debut novel When She Was Ours. Her book follows the lives of Thea Erickson, a renowned surgeon facing a terminal illness, and her two young adult daughters who must grieve and move on while also reckoning with painful new discoveries of their mother’s past. (It’s already garnering praise.) Take it away, Anna!
What are you reading right now? Flashlight, by Susan Choi. I love a family story with a mystery at the center, and it’s brilliantly written. But I haven’t been able to fully submerge myself because I’m still haunted by the last book I read, Charlotte McConaghy’s Wild Dark Shore. On its face the premise feels absurd—a family lives on a remote island near Antarctica, charged with caring for an international seed bank—but it’s one of the most real families I’ve ever encountered in literature. I can’t stop thinking about those characters. I miss them.
What’s your favorite re-read? This is such a tough question because I have so many— if I ever did a Substack, I would call it The Great Reread. Little Women, Portrait of a Lady, and all of Jane Austen are up there, but if you held a gun to my head, I’d have to say Persuasion. I reread it every August. It’s Austen’s only novel about later season love, not first love, and the older I get, the more its combination of loss and hope resonates.
What was dinner last night? My family is in Maine right now, and we went out to a restaurant and ordered all the classics—clam chowder, mussels, steamed lobster, blueberry crumble for dessert*. What can I say, it tasted like childhood.
That sounds like maybe the most ideal dinner ever. Thanks for playing, Anna, and huge congrats on When She Was Ours!
*I think we should take Anna’s last answer as a sign that tonight’s dinner should be Maine-Style Fish Chowder and Blueberry Crisp.
Thanks for reading,
Jenny
P.S. I can’t believe the light up here. ✨
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Yes, grate your tomatoes for pan con tomat, but don't throw away the juice at the bottom of the bowl! Salt it and use it in a tomato martini with vodka. Even better with a drop or two of vinegar and a float of olive oil on top. Cherry tomato garnish.
Pan con tomate is just perfect. In Chile, this is the food of 'la once' — the meal that took the place of dinner, when most of us gather at the table for bread and tea instead.
We make it with marraqueta: a bread whose crust is so thin it shatters the moment you press it, with a crumb full of air. We split it open and put the tomato inside, where that crumb drinks the juice right up like a sponge. The humblest plate, and the one you never tire of.