Fried Green Tomatoes

With all the tomato plants that I seeded and planted, none of them did very well. I've picked a ton of green tomatoes and I can only see two on the vines still that are starting to ripen. I'm a little disappointed. BUT at the same time this means that I get to make fried green tomatoes.

Fried Green Tomatoes

Green tomatoes - sliced into approximately 1/4 inch thick slices

Flour, about 1 cup, more if you have a lot of tomatoes

Sugar, about 1 tbsp

Salt & pepper, to taste

Bread crumbs, meh, maybe 1 1/2 cups, more if you have a lot of tomatoes

Vegetable oil, enough to cover about 1 to 1 1/2 inches in a deep pan

Eggs, 2, maybe 3 if you have a lot of tomatoes

Salt, 2 - 3 tbsp (more if you have a lot of tomatoes)

Slice your tomatoes.

Lay them out onto a sheet pan and sprinkle both sides with salt and sugar. You want the tomatoes to sweat. If they don't have a lot of moisture in them when they're fried, then they'll be super nice and crunchy and they will hold their shape a lot better, plus they won't be mushy. I hate mushy fried green tomatoes. Let them sweat for 15 minutes.

Lay out 3 bowls while the tomatoes are sweating - these are for breading.

Bowl 1 - the flour, salt & pepper

Bowl 2 - the eggs, beaten very well

Bowl 3 - bread crumbs

Once the tomatoes are done sweating fill a deep pan with about an inch of vegetable oil. Heat it over medium high heat, then drop the temp if needed. You'll see when you start frying, it's sort of a form of art...

Now bread the tomatoes. I use my fingers. Drop a slice into the flour and cover, shake off the excess. Put the flour-covered tomato slice into the egg, cover it with egg. Drop the egg-covered tomato slice into the bread crumbs and cover with bread crumbs. I put them onto a separate plate once finished with breading.

Once you have them all breaded take them to the hot oil and drop them into the hot oil one at a time. I can only fry maybe 4 slices at a time before the temp of the oil goes down too far and I get mushy tomatoes. I don't flip the tomatoes at all, I just let the oil do the work, this is why you have a good inch of oil to start with. 

Fry them for 1, 2, or 3 minutes depending on how hot your oil is, once the tomatoes are a nice golden brown then take the tomato out of the oil and put it onto a plate, I put paper towels down to soak up the excess oil.

Serve with ketchup if you want, or BBQ sauce, or ranch, or honey mustard.

Enjoy!!