Tomatoes on toast and toddler jet lag

So underrated, so universally delish (the toast, not the jet lag)

I put lovage on mine. How do you do yours?

Hello my friends - it feels good to be back here in your inbox, and thank you so much for your continued support of this newsletter. As I return from the sun-and-rain-soaked paradise that is Sri Lanka, and we inevitably come back down to earth from what was the trip of a lifetime (itinerary details and recipes on this will be coming here to paid subs), my mind buzzing with vibrant flavours and culinary adventures - a new challenge has reared its ugly head. Jet lag: that sneaky, uninvited companion of globetrotters, has only gone and cast its wicked spell upon our tiny little explorer. And what else can you expect when you travel long haul with a toddler? I won’t go into the appalling debacle we had at Heathrow involving a cowboy parking company and a lost car key, but let’s just say there wasn’t much sleep happening in our family for a good 24 hours on our way back… so I’m easing back into things here with this gentle love letter to our saviour this week: tomatoes on toast.

The struggle that follows the upheaval of time zones for a far-flung holiday is a privilege, really though, and always worth it, isn’t it? For the memories, the special time carved out together as a family, the venturing outside of your comfort zone and the exposure to new sights, sounds, environments and flavours, the latter being a huge driver for me when I’m thinking about planning a trip. And as an aside, this month’s Something For the Weekend recipe special lands on Friday, and of course it’s infused with some culinary inspiration from our travels, because I couldn’t help myself. It’s not curry (though that will come), but I really can’t wait to share it with you - and if you’re debating whether or not to join the fun, as this will be for paid subscribers only, think of it like this: an exclusive membership to my one-of-a-kind, seasonally-shifting, interactive, and ever-evolving treasure trove of recipes that will tease your tastebuds and up your cooking game. By joining our A Lot On Her Plate community, you'll gain exclusive access to tried and tested recipes, as well as becoming a part of a passionate group of joy-seeking, food-loving individuals. You'll also unlock a world of benefits, including engaging chats, exciting giveaways with beloved brands, my curated travel guides, and access to my entire recipe archive. Plus, your support will help me continue developing recipes and crafting these newsletters. Join us today for less than a pound a week (annual subscription) and become a legendary part of our food-loving community.

On the flipside of recipe development, the mum in me has spent a lot of energy this week pandering to the whims of a grouchy toddler and getting her settled back into some kind of routine. She did so well on the trip, during which we travelled to a different part of the island every couple of days, but her eating while we were away was a bit up and down - partly down to the heat, and partly the fact she couldn’t get far past the unbelievably flavourful bananas and assorted baked goods basket that came with every hotel meal (in the end we had to ask the waiters to hide them), though she was a huge fan of the lush buffalo curd and treacle, which was a helpful and wholesome way to fill her up. I’ll be writing in more detail about this amazing delicacy at some point. She has been particularly feisty and fussy on our return, with her body clock all out of whack, bless her. Suffice to say, I’ve spent a great deal of time and energy so far this week creating lovingly made, vegetable-packed, from-scratch food that’s ended up on the floor, or in our dog Cyril’s always accommodating mouth.

Curd and treacle being devoured at Colombo airport

One thing we have been able to agree on though, is tomatoes on toast. It might sound prosaic, but really, this is something I’m serious about. I’d go as far as to say that when tomato season hits, it’s an obsession. And thankfully, my daughter is of the same view. There are few things more simple, or more devourable to me, than crunchy golden toast topped with slices of sea salt studded, black pepper laced tomatoes. It’s also the perfect hot weather, can’t-be-arsed-to-cook food, that can be thrown together in a matter of minutes but feels special enough to be a meal in itself. Sometimes I add some giant butterbeans dressed with shallots, red wine vinegar and olive oil to bulk it up, and sometimes there’s ricotta or goat’s curd, but this week, it’s been a more purist pursuit. I just love how the sweet, juicy, slightly acidic fruit mushes into the holes in the toast, its juices melding with the fat. I eat it for breakfast, I eat it for lunch, I eat it for an afternoon snack: you get the picture. I’m not going to patronise you by supplying a recipe for this - but there are a few simple yet specific principles unique to the way I like my tomatoes on toast.

I feel like it’s the sort of dish that people have their own very personal way of making, and I would love to hear about the different ways we all enjoy this, because perhaps you’ve also been succumbing to its charms over the past couple of weeks? It’s worth saying that while I obviously prefer the superior depth of flavour, texture and juice output of fancy heritage tomatoes, these can be harder to find on our little stretch of the Kent coast (though we have a trusty supplier in The Merchant of Relish), and so I’m talking about using pretty bog standard, readily-available tomatoes here. The ones we get in our organic veg box are tasty (in that they really do taste like tomatoes), but not ethereally good, but then I’m minded to think that exceptional tomatoes are best eaten by themselves with just a little salt and evoo. The whole point of tomatoes on toast is that, while it’s clearly elevated by superior tomatoes, it’s also a ridiculously easy, delicious way of pimping up standard tomatoes while they’re in season. On that note, I like to use raw, medium sized tomatoes (cherries slide off unless confit or roasted), sliced into medium thick slices and always, always seasoned with crunchy flakes of sea salt. I also quite like a good pinch of freshly ground white pepper, rather than black, for its slightly musty, gingery flavour and subtle heat, but black had to do on this occasion.

I’m absolutely a fan of the Spanish pan con tomate, with its grated tomatoes and garlic-rubbed bread, and I love a tomato bruschetta too, with olive oil and basil, but my go-to take on the delicacy is a little more British. There’s no garlic, because I do find it can distract, and rather than olive oil, I use good salted butter - enough that it’s soaking down onto the plate through the holes in the toasted sourdough. We have a great sourdough supplier, via our local deli Arnos, and I like it to be sliced medium thick, toasted until golden, nutty and crisp at the surface but still a little spongy within, and buttered while hot. You may baulk at that detail (like, duh! of course), but my dad and some people of his generation liked to insist on cooling his toast in a toast rack and then buttering it generously once cool, so that the butter formed a visibly creamy layer. I do this very occasionally, with marmalade or Marmite, but for this, I want my butter melted and mingling with those slurpy tomato juices.

Herb-wise, tomatoes always benefit from a little buddy up with a fresh green herb, and lately I’ve been using lovage: that forgotten, intensely perfumed spicy celery flavoured herb that grows wildly in our garden at the moment - a couple of leaves, rolled tightly and very finely chopped, because it packs a BIG punch. As an aside, lovage is really amazing when married with tomatoes, and it’s well worth trying to get hold of some seeds and sowing them for your garden or pots, because it grows really enthusiastically and is excellent in fish curry, in salads, pastas, tarts, etc. I love it particularly because try as I might, I never have much luck with basil. And that’s it, that’s how I do my tomatoes on toast, and how my daughter has been, for now, enjoying it too. And I’m so thankful for that. And for strawberries, which have become a crucial bargaining/placatory tool during the mid-afternoon slump. Red fruit for the win!

Our amazingly profuse lovage situation

And that’s how, amidst the whirlwind of jet lag and tomato-smeared chaos, we find solace in humble flavours. So here’s to the whimsical, drunken dance of jet-lagged toddlers, and the resilient spirit of both parent and child as we navigate colliding time zones, and revel in the joyous mess that accompanies the pursuit of adventure. Now pass the chilled Gamay!

Here are three ways I’m coping with the post holiday blues and British heatwave:

Watching Glastonbury on iPlayer, with cold beers and almond Magnums. Favourite sets this year were Manic Street Preachers, Young Fathers (just so mesmerising and powerful), Lizzo and Elton John. I found the Arctic Monkeys kind of frustrating as every song was a beat too slow…

Spending a lot of time in our wild and wonderful garden with my daughter before and after work, and cutting some flowers to bring the outdoors in.

Slowly restocking my fridge with ingredients I love to cook with. There is so much incredible fruit around at the moment, some of which will definitely be featuring in this week’s Something For the Weekend…