Fried Green Tomatoes

Most of us remember the movie, “Fried Green Tomatoes,” starring Jessica Tandy, Kathy Bates, Mary Stuart Masterson, and Mary Louise Parker. In the movie, they had a restaurant that served fried green tomatoes. Ever since I saw that movie, I wondered what fried green tomatoes would taste like.

As many of you know, we have a garden in our backyard. We have 3 tomato plants – a cherry tomato plant, a celebrity tomato plant, and a roma tomato plant. We have picked tons of the cherry tomatoes, but the celebrity and roma tomatoes just don’t want to ripen and when they do, they are overripe.

So, I decided to take my green tomatoes and make fried green tomatoes.

I started with my green tomatoes.

I sliced them to my desired thickness and added salt and pepper and let them sit for 10 or 15 minutes (I wasn’t technically timing – it could have been longer or shorter). This helped to juice them.

I measured out 1/2 cup flour and 1/4 cup milk and put them in separate dishes.

The recipe called for dry bread crumbs or cornmeal, but I didn’t have either so I used saltines. I put about 15 saltines in a bag, sealed the bag, and crushed them using a rolling pin – rolling over the crackers in the bag over and over again until they were crushed. I beat 2 eggs and put them in a separate dish.

In a pan, I heated some olive oil over medium heat. I didn’t measure it, but I poured enough to coat the bottom of the pan.

I then took my tomato slices one at a time and dipped them in milk, then flour, then the egg, and then the crackers (or bread crumbs or corn meal). I added them to the pan.

I let the tomatoes cook for about 5 or 6 minutes (or until they were brown). Then I turned them over and cooked them for another 5 or 6 minutes.

For the second round, I added more olive oil to the pan and repeated the process.

Fried Green Tomatoes were served. I added a little bit of salt to them. They were delicious! We didn’t have any ranch dressing, but I’ve heard some people like to eat them with the ranch dressing.