Fermented Tomato Harmony
Welcome to Gourmet magazine, an independently owned digital food magazine that’s not affiliated with the Gourmet magazines of yore. Our Thursday editions are where we feature a great new recipe. Tuesday is for features.
IN THIS ISSUE: Baby Bistro’s glorious summer tomato elixir and two tales from the kitchen as we tested the recipe.
Appetizers
Tommy Time
When Alex first brought up the idea of running a recipe for Baby Bistro’s fermented tomato water, I was admittedly a little bit nervous. I had flirted with tomato fermentation in the past, and always with mixed results—twice I had ended up with concoctions that were perhaps…too piquant. The reasons for my misadventures became clear: Miles Thompson’s recipe called for a higher percentage of salt than I had used in the past—3% salt by weight rather than my 2.5%—which is often a good insurance policy against the proliferation of various microorganisms that could offer off-flavors. Not only that, he recommended fermenting at room temperature for just three or four days; I’m pretty sure I let my last batch go for a couple of weeks. His method yielded a bright, salty, sunny brew that jumps on the palate, a liquid that tastes essentially of summer tomato with a shimmering undercurrent of umami fizz. I’ve got a good bit leftover from my testing, and I’m looking forward to splashing it here and there until it is all gone—and then fermenting an even bigger batch to get me through the long New York winter. —Amiel
Tommy Time, the Return
I spent the three days my pureed tomatoes fermented in their mason jar eagerly anticipating the clarified essence-of-tomato that I’d use all over my late summer cooking. Then it came time to strain the mixture, and however much you are imagining it got everywhere when I say I tipped the jar wrong and splashed salty, lightly effervescent tomato all over my kitchen…it was more. By the time I cleaned the mess up (my socks were soaked) and salvaged what made it into the sieve, I needed a bit of a break from the idea entirely. Fortunately, I’ve recovered, and a big splash of fermented tomato water will be making it into this summer’s batch of gazpacho. —Nozlee
Fermented Tomato Harmony
Recipe by Miles Thompson, text by Alex Tatusian
Riffing on the summer tomato bounty the Baby Bistro way.
We’re spending the week with Miles Thompson of the acclaimed L.A.-core restaurant Baby Bistro. On Tuesday we dug into his life cooking in/for/with Los Angeles, and today we’ve got a simple subrecipe that can be spun off into a thousand and one seasonal delights (we give you two).
When I ate at Baby Bistro for the first time, it was not in the beautifully refurbished bungalow where it now resides. Three years ago, the restaurant made a brief run in a decommissioned barber shop at a stately old hotel in Koreatown. Burnt out on late-pandemic pop-ups, I was loath to go. But it was right where we needed to be for a group dinner, and I saw that Andy Schwartz of the beloved wine bar Café Triste was involved.
Absurd checkered floors and mirrors (the space felt, not unpleasantly, like a cigar bar or men’s club) rubbed up against the intellect and sensitivity of the food. I’m not a restaurant critic, nor do I have especially strong flavor recall; I can, however, call up the first dish I ate that night like it was yesterday.