Tomato Pie

This is a relatively recent discovery for me, but I've quickly fallen in love with it, as I hope you will too.

Earlier this year NPR ran a "How Low Can You Go" family supper challenge in which listeners were encouraged to enter their best $10 or less dinner recipe. The winner was, what I thought was a decidedly dumpy, tomato pie. I couldn't believe that with all the amazing things you can do with squash, lentils, Bulgar wheat, pasta, couscous, slow cooked meats, that the winner was a pile of tomatoes and onions topped with cheese and mayonnaise. Mayo? Are you kidding me?

Still, my partner Christian insisted on giving it a try. I was fortunately out of town when he did. He and our son, Jerrod, claimed to love this tomato pie and were determined to get me to try it too.

So I gave in, but of course I had to spiff it up a little with some gourmet changes. I have to admit, this was not only a fantastic dish, but I've already made it twice in the last week and am sure to keep it around as a family favorite!

What is really so fascinating about this recipe is that it's fairly easy and quite versatile. You could add sliced fennel, any number of herbs, use any kind of onions you have on hand. We've also used goat cheese inside with a 2-year aged Cheddar on the top. Heirloom tomatoes work great too, but they can be expensive. A combo of heirloom and conventional tomatoes works well.

If you look at the NPR winning recipe, it uses a Bisquick dough. We strictly veer away from boxed items (I don't think it's that hard to mix four or five dry ingredients and I don't like the extra chemicals thrown in). When Christian made it, he used a homemade all-butter pie crust. Both times I made it I used a buttermilk biscuit crust.

There are a few keys to this recipe. I think, and Christian agrees, that a biscuit crust on the bottom is best. It does end up getting a little mushy from the tomato runoff, but that's one of the best parts. The other key is to pile it very high with sweet onions and sliced tomatoes because it will bake down quite a bit, so you need lots of volume to make up for it.

But what about the mayo? In this sort of context I always have to remind myself that mayo is just oil, egg yolk, lemon juice and salt. I've taken to making my own mayo at home rather than buying it, and so I often make it with a combo of canola and olive oils.

When it's baked with the mayo on top, it doesn't turn out oily, but it sort of melds with the cheese to get a nice crisp around the edges, and it adds a real creaminess to the dish. I know it sounds odd, or even a little crazy, but it really does work.

To clarify something in the NPR recipe, you want to use some kind of a biscuit recipe, preferably from scratch made with butter. Line the bottom of your pie plate or casserole with it, blind bake it (bake it alone without the other pie ingredients on it) according to the biscuit recipe, then let it cool slightly while preparing the tomatoes and other ingredients. I don't have any problem with biscuit dough it rising out of control, so I wouldn't bother with pie weights. You don't want too much dough in the dish though, so be careful to only add enough to make about an inch-thick crust.

I didn't think there was a lot of point to mushing the shredded cheese and mayo with my hands, so just mixed it well in a bowl. As I've said before, when used properly, salt just makes ingredients taste more like themselves, so I believe in using a goodly amount of salt (and pepper) in all my cooking. In this case, I did season each layer in the pie and I seasoned the cheese mixture in the bowl before topping the pie.

What's interesting is that James Beard apparently had a tomato cheese pie recipe in one of his cookbooks which Gourmet Magazine recently adapted along with a recipe from Laurie

Colwin. Elise over at Simply Recipes also recently posted a tomato pie recipe using mayonnaise (she too had the WTF response to the phrase "Tomato Pie". I like that Elise's recipe squeezes moisture out of the tomatoes. I did consider doing this on my second attempt, or salting them for around 15 minutes in a colander to drain the moisture off. Admittedly, this is nearly impossible to cut and serve like a typical pie given its very loose nature.

Here is my adapted recipe:

Buttermilk Biscuit Crust

1 cup AP flour

1½ tsp. baking powder

1½ tsp. sugar

½ tsp. salt

¼ tsp. baking soda

2 tbsp.

cold unsalted butter cut into ¼-inch cubes

¾ cup cold buttermilk

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. In food processor, pulse flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, baking soda to combine. Scatter butter cubes evenly over dry ingredients; pulse until mixture is coarse and pebbly, about eight to 10 1-second pulses. Alternatively this can be done using a pastry blender to cut the butter into the dry ingredients. Transfer mixture to a medium bowl. Add buttermilk to dry ingredients and mix with a rubber spatula until just incorporated. Dough should be very wet and slightly lumpy.

Pour dough into a buttered deep-dish pie plate or 2-qt casserole dish, spreading evenly over the bottom. Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until baked through and golden brown.

Tomato Pie

2-3 pounds fresh tomatoes, sliced about ¼-inch thick

1 large, preferably sweet-variety onion, halved then sliced 1/8-inch thick

½ cup fresh basil torn by hand

2 cups shredded cheddar cheese

1 cup mayonnaise

Salt

Freshly cracked black pepper

Any optional ingredients like goat cheese, mozzarella, sliced fennel, etc

Reduce oven temp to 350 degrees. On top of the baked biscuit crust, layer tomato, onion, basil, optional ingredients, seasoning each layer well with salt and pepper.

In a small bowl, combine shredded cheese, mayonnaise. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Spread cheese mixture over the pie ingredients. Place pie plate or casserole dish on a baking sheet to catch any spills while baking.

Bake approximately 45 minutes, testing doneness with a knife, tomatoes should be softened but with slight firmness remaining. Cool slightly before serving.