Tomatoes...

Tomatoes...  One thing I always missed in California was tomatoes.  That is, tomatoes that actually tasted like tomatoes – more particularly, like the tomatoes grown in New Jersey when I was a kid.  You could not buy good tomatoes like that in California –  not for any amount of money, from any store.  They just didn't exist.  Once every few years my mom and dad would send me a box of New Jersey tomatoes, and for a few days we'd feast on them.  That was the only time I got decent tomatoes for the last 40 years or so.

Until today.

My friend and neighbor Tim D. bought a big box of local tomatoes today that he's going to use to make salsa (the cooked kind).  He gave me five nice-looking tomatoes out of that box, and I ate two of them for my lunch.  I just washed them off, cut them up, and ate them with a little mayonnaise.  They were every bit as good as the best tomatoes I remember when growing up – dead ripe, with the texture of the flesh perfect, and they were juicy and full of luscious ripe tomato flavor.  Oh, man, what a delightful discovery!  I live in a place that can grow real tomatoes!!  Wahoo!!!