Some memories are sun-warmed and red-stained, like tomatoes still warm from the vine. In my Southern garden, heirloom tomatoes aren’t just vegetables. They’re history, flavor, and summer all wrapped in one.
There’s no mistaking the smell of a tomato vine that’s been brushed by little fingers searching for the ripe fruit on plant. I’m immediately transported back to summers when my children were small, very excited to see what we grew in our tiny backyard garden. There are certain smells that say “summer” to me, and a tomato vine will always be one of them.
This post is part of Old-Fashioned Summer Saturdays, a weekly series where I share timeless Southern joys, from gardening and seasonal recipes to vintage-style living. If you found your way here from Instagram, Pinterest or Google, I hope you’ll stay a while and explore the other articles in the series.
The tomato is one of the most popular and versatile treasures in the Southern garden. While many gardeners will grow enough to can and preserve tomatoes for their pantry, the vast majority of us backyard gardeners are chasing the heirloom beauties for one major purpose: the tomato sandwich. It’s a sandwich that has graced generations of Southern tables, humble in appearance, but unforgettable in flavor.
It’s undisputed that the Southern tomato sandwich consists of two slices of Sunbeam bread dressed with Duke’s mayonnaise and filled with slices of garden-fresh tomatoes (salted and peppered, of course). However, today I would like to offer a couple of variations of the classic Southern tomato sandwich.
The first variation on the classic Southern tomato sandwich is to add another Southern delicacy, pimento cheese. I love to cover one piece of Sunbeam bread in pimento cheese, instead of the Duke’s mayonnaise, and add my fresh tomato slices. From here you can go one of two ways in order to finish the sandwich: a slice of cooked bacon or some zippy refrigerator pickles. Both are equally as delicious with the fresh tomato and pimento cheese, but my favorite way is to add the refrigerator pickles. The tartness of the pickles slices right through the richness of the pimento cheese. A pickle and pimento cheese sandwich? Absolutely not. A tomato sandwich with pimento cheese and refrigerator pickles? You do not know what you’re missing out on! (Refrigerator pickle recipe HERE.)
The second variation on the original Southern tomato sandwich is to swap the Sunbeam bread for some sourdough slices. We’re making a summer tomato grilled cheese sandwich. Instead of using the Duke’s mayonnaise on the inside of the sandwich, we’re going to “butter” the outside of the bread with it. Select some cheese slices of your choosing, but I suggest some mozzarella slices for the direction we’re going in. After you salt and pepper some tomato slices, add them to your sandwich before cooking it like you would any other grilled cheese sandwich. All you need at this point is some balsamic glaze or dressing to dip your sandwich in. It’s heaven on a plate.
A vine-ripened tomato is a thing of glory. But if I have to be honest, I’m often fighting the squirrels for my ripe tomatoes. I usually pick them when they are just starting to blush, and I allow them to finish ripening in our bright kitchen windows. Our kitchen becomes dressed in the colors of our harvest, and the air becomes scented with the fruits of our labor. I found this wonderful candle scent called “tomato and vine.” It’s not the exact same thing as a fresh tomato on the windowsill, but it’s nostalgic and beautiful. I just had to share it!
There’s something sacred about the slowness of tending a tomato vine. It’s a ritual, a heritage, a love letter to simpler days…and one bite brings it all rushing back.
Below is a round-up of a few of my favorite tomato-related things! Click the photo to shop or find the complete list HERE. I hope you’ll come back next week for the newest installment of Old-Fashioned Summer Saturdays.
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This article is part of my Old-Fashioned Summer Saturdays series, where I share timeless inspiration for warm-weather living. Be sure to check out these reader favorites:
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