Tomatillos: a fruit that doesn't make demands
By Barbara Damrosch
In late summer, the garden overflows with vegetables that must be watched carefully for their fleeting moments of glory: the corn before its sweetness fades, green beans before they toughen, tomatoes before they swell, soften and splatter the ground. Tomatillos, on the other hand, are patient and gradual in their path to ripeness, sparing the busy gardener any panic or haste.
Tomatillos, as their common name suggests, are kin to tomatoes but distant cousins at best. Their botanical name is Physalis ixocarpa, and they are more closely related to Chinese lanterns ( Physalis alkekengi), the papery orange-colored puffs used in dried flower arrangements. Tomatillo fruits are formed inside similar thin lanterns, but these are bright green, turning eventually to light brown. As the hard green fruits ripen within, they burst their husks and usually turn a pale yellow. (One variety, called De Milpa, is purplish.) They keep for weeks, whether lying on the ground under the plants or sitting in a bowl on the kitchen table.
Tomatillos are grown just like tomatoes, started indoors and transplanted outside after the danger of frost subsides. I plant them in tomato cages, which they soon outgrow, the fragile stems breaking when they flop over the tops of the cages. Then I cut them off since the crop is always abundant. I have also trained them on a lattice fence, where they make a lush, blemish-free leafy screen, the little lanterns dangling handsomely.
The fruit varies in size from that of a large grape to a large plum. Green and yellow tomatillos are edible raw or cooked; the green are more tart. Cooking softens the sharpness as well as the crisp texture, with no loss of the distinctive flavor, and the cooked flesh has a viscosity that is great for thickening soups and sauces.
My favorite method, inspired by a recipe by chef Rick Bayless, is to roast them, still in their husks, at 450 degrees for 15 minutes on a baking sheet along with sweet peppers, hot peppers, onions and whole, unpeeled cloves of garlic. (The roasted onions and sweet peppers sweeten the dish.) Although the skin of the tomatillo is edible, I squeeze out the very soft cooked flesh, just as I do the flesh of the roasted garlic, then chop or puree all the vegetables together, adding olive oil, salt and cilantro. This makes a fine dip or a topping for bruschetta, eggs or firm fish such as halibut. Roasted corn kernels make a good addition, and I once tried it with a few roasted tomatoes as well. They overpowered the tomatillos' subtle flavor, though, so I now let that familiar cousin keep its distance.
Article copyright of Barbara Damrosch
Creative Commons photo credit: Urtica
