She had an ample garden and created a bevy of great vegetable recipes. But for home cooking, the recipes can’t be beat. Her cookbooks are reflective of an earlier era, and curiously contain instructions like “Accent can improve anything,” when any good cook now knows that Accent is pure MSG. On my next trip through the kitchen I add some celery and quartered potatoes…when I get around to it, I add some tomato paste…” Many of her narrative books contain recipes, too, written like this: “Then I add a cup or so of carrots cut in pieces, quartered onions or small white ones, half a parsnip, and, if I have it, a wedge or so of turnip. Of her cookbooks the best is Gladys Taber’s Stillmeadow Cookbook (1965). Among the most known are Harvest of Yesterdays (1976) and Country Chronicle (1974). It was a home she refurbished over many years, with the amusing progress, or lack thereof, documented in her writing. Most of the time she lived in Stillmeadow, a 1690 farmhouse near Southbury, Connecticut. Writing about gardening, raising animals, pets, and cooking dominated the themes of her columns, much like these very blogs on. Her column “Diary of Domesticity” began in Ladies Home Journal in November 1937, and she wrote a similar column, “Butternut Wisdom” for Family Circle from 1959 to 1967. (I am guilty myself of spending the 90s writing “how to get flat abs” and “build big biceps” for men’s fitness magazines). Gladys Taber came from an era of literary nonfiction, when writers mused and observed rather than wrote a stream of how-to pieces. (Remember natural-eating Euell Gibbons, and Johnny Carson doing funny skits about Euell Gibbons eating twigs and leaves?) How nice to discover someone who was writing about gardening, cooking, country living, the coziness of home and family, and the beauty of nature - and was doing it decades ago - during the suburbanizing 1950s, the plasticine 60s and wrapping up her career in the 70s, when there was finally a turnabout in the appreciation of Mother Earth. Her Fried Red Tomatoes Recipe is simple to make, yet gourmet to the taste buds. Serve immediately.Ĭountry cookin’ Gladys Taber is a little-known American gem. Add another 2 tablespoons of butter to pan and heat butter to repeat the process for additional tomatoes, if needed.Fry an additional 5-7 minutes, testing with fork to see if tomatoes are tender. Gently turn each with a large fork to fry on the other side.Once butter is hot, place tomatoes in a single layer in pan and fry, uncovered, until golden brown, approximately 7-10 minutes.Dip each tomato slice into cream, then dip into cornmeal mixture and coat thoroughly on both sides. Mix cornmeal, tarragon leaves and salt in a shallow bowl and stir to mix thoroughly.
Heat butter on medium low heat in a heavy skillet.
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