The tomatoes I never knew

Went to a small farmer's market in Nassau Bay this morning. It was hot, and Declan cried after about 4 minutes of being in his car seat, so I didn't spend a lot of time at the market.

We did buy some grass-fed beef (hamburger and a roast), some local organic tomatoes, a ginger cookie, some carrot salsa, some yard eggs from healthy hens with lots of room to roam and play, and some organic lettuce.

So tonight, we had burgers on the grill with our fancy grass-fed beef. Wow. It did taste better. Maybe I was imagining some of it, but I really do think it tasted better than the store bought stuff.

We are seriously considering buying a side of local grass-fed beef, but not until we get a deep freeze, and not until hurricane season is mostly over. I'd hate to lose a thousand dollars of meat and veggies due to a hurricane, and we don't have a generator.

But the most incredible thing was the tomatoes. Now, I'm not a fan of tomatoes. When I was a wee tot, I had a battle of wills with my babysitter over eating a tomato in my vegetable soup. I couldn't leave the table until I ate it. I was still sitting at the table when my mom came to pick me up. My fondness for them hasn't improved a whole lot, but I will eat them cooked. I usually hate them raw.

Well, I sliced one of the local tomatoes up to have on our burgers. It was incredible! It was so yummy that I ate the entire tomato by myself. Raw. I have never, ever done that. I know that store-bought tomatoes are hard and tasteless, but I never knew fresh, local tomatoes could taste so incredible. I'm a convert now. I think I'll go back to the farmer's market next week and buy a bunch of tomatoes and can them for later this year. I don't want to eat store bought tomatoes anymore.