Here’s the deal. Tomatoes are only worth eating during the short two and half months of late summer when they’re fragrant and fabulous and scented from the field. Right now, local tomatoes are at their absolute summer peak. Buy them and eat them at every meal until you can’t possibly eat another. This way, you’ll be able to refuse all those nasty winter tomatoes.
If you love ripe summer tomatoes, get them while they’re good, but remember these storage tips: it’s easy to ruin those summer tomatoes!
Never refrigerate a tomato. The flavor profile of tomatoes changes and narrows with refrigeration – and once a tomato has been refrigerated, it will never taste the same again.
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Buy tomatoes in different stages of ripeness according to the days you will eat them. Super ripe tomatoes for today, less so for tomorrow, and so on. Don’t buy several tomatoes in the same stage of ripeness unless you plan to eat them all in one go! This way, you won’t be tempted to refrigerate (and ruin) them.
Slightly under ripe tomatoes are less likely to have been damaged in transit to the farmer’s market (or by you, to be honest, jostling them on the way home). It’s safest to buy slightly under ripe tomatoes and then ripen them at home.
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Store tomatoes upside down on their stem ends. This is the last section of the tomato to ripen, and therefore, its hardest. When tomatoes are stored on their stem ends, they’re less likely to collapse, bruise and burst.
To ripen tomatoes quickly, don’t put them on the windowsill. Instead, place them in a brown paper bag with a banana. Alternately, you can also just put the tomatoes together in the paper bag. Both techniques concentrate the naturally occurring ethylene gas that ripens fruit.
The New Rochelle BID’s Downtown Grand Market is a morning farmer’s market. Located at Library Green (1 Lawton St, New Rochelle, NY) every Sat from June 1–Oct. 26 at 9 a.m–2 p.m. Contact info@grandmarket.com or call 914-960-1460 for more info.
