Labor Day marks the end of summer, and typically by now, I have been enjoying pounds of summer tomatoes every which way. This year’s unusual weather meant a very delayed tomato season, at least here in Northern California, so I have consumed far fewer tomatoes than usual. We’re starting to get some decent tomatoes, so I thought it might be time to bring out this simple recipe from Taiwan. I first made this recipe four years ago, when a family medical emergency gave me the opportunity to spend a few weeks with my parents. This recipe came from a surprising source of inspiration– my father, who doesn’t cook, and doesn’t usually make specific food requests. But when I brought home a bag of beautiful beefsteak tomatoes from a farmers’ market in their New England town, he asked if I could prepare them the way they enjoy them in Taiwan, with a simple soy sauce-ginger dressing. (What he actually said was “with soy sauce and some kind of spice.”) I didn’t grow up eating this salad, so I asked my mom about it.  She said that it’s a common way to that people in the Taiwanese countryside eat tomatoes, especially in the South, where my parents both grew up, and she never thought of it as anything special. She actually forgot about it for many decades after relocating to Taipei, and then the US. It wasn’t until my parents moved back part-time to Taiwan about a decade ago that they began to eat tomatoes this way again. This is an example of a non-recipe recipe in which the delicious and refreshing whole is much greater than the sum of its parts.  Please add it to your summer tomato rotation and let me know what you think!

Taiwanese Tomato Salad

Serves: 4 as a side or starter

Ingredients

2-3 medium, very ripe beefsteak tomatoes
a thumb of ginger (about 2 inches)
1 tsp sugar
2 tsp soy sauce

Technique

1.  Core and slice tomatoes into wedges and place into a bowl.
2. Peel and grate ginger (using a Japanese ginger grater, as pictured below, is ideal but you can also use a rasp grater, like a Microplane), and add it and its juices to a small bowl with the sugar and soy sauce.  Adjust for gingeryness and sweetness.  Stir until sugar is dissolved.
3. Pour over the tomatoes, and allow to sit for 15-30 minutes before serving.  Arrange on a plate to serve, and optionally garnish with thinly sliced scallions.