recipe from Scibona, S

Here’s something I like, based on a recipe by Marcella Hazan: a tomato salad that follows the ideal of preparing an ingredient so that it just tastes vibrantly of itself.

In a shot glass, mix a teaspoon of salt with four crushed cloves of garlic. Fill with red wine vinegar and let steep for thirty minutes. Throw out the garlic. Slice three large tomatoes into thick rounds and arrange them in overlapping layers on a broad, shallow dish. Tear a dozen leaves of basil over them, add fresh grindings of black pepper, pour on the vinegar, and cover with olive oil. Do not use cheap oil, yo.

Do not make this unless you have real homegrown or farmers’ market tomatoes, in season. Use a few different varieties, of different colors, if you please. Serve with bread to soak up the juice.

Most people to whom I’ve served this refer to what they’re eating as “tomatoes”—not a salad or a dish of any kind. Nothing gets in the way. It’s a plate of tomatoes, emphatically so.