cherry marys

[soundtrack can be found here--click "samples" then "girl wants (to say goodbye) to rock 'n' roll".]

mighty monkeys! it's labour day weekend already, which means the summer season is nearly kaput for most people who live where there are actual seasons, and nearly beginning for our antipodean friends, so perhaps i should roll out some of those recipes i've been meaning to get to.

a while back, anthony at spiceblog was envisioning a rock (music) themed meal, which involved a lot of musings, dischordant rants, and i think even a few dishes. i promised a suitable starter, so i lifted one from a peculiar cookbook, "loving and cooking with reckless abandon" by kevin gould. the hardback edition looks like it was conceived by a hopped up junior high school yearbook editor pre-apple IIe days (namely: me, then), the recipes odd but plausible (butter sesame carrots with fizzy water, f'r'instance), and the ramblings...well, rambling (this post would do it proud).

so what's the recipe, already? you impatiently ask. why, it's the cherry mary. originally christened by kevvy kev something incredibly naff--"tomatoes with a love injection"--it has been universally reborn as what it really is: a baby bloody mary injected into a cherry tomato. i also like the name because it reminds me of my favourite character, mary cherry, from the misnomered, quickly cancelled teen bitchfest "popular" (which comes out on dvd in september, yay).

I DIGRESS.

here, quickly, the recipe, slightly tweaked:

12 cherry tomatoes, brought to room temperature
a good pinch of salt
juice from one small lime
1 tbsp worcestershire sauce
1 tsp red or green tabasco sauce
a dash of celery salt
1 crushed garlic clove
200ml good quality vodka

using an empty syringe, enter each tomato through the skin near its green head, and remove as much juice as you are able. dissolve the salt in the lime juice, add the rest of the ingredients, except the vodka. zap in the microwave for a minute, cool. strain in cheesecloth, muslin, or even a paper towel. add vodka. fill the syringe with the filtered liquid and tap it a couple of time to remove any air bubbles and to appear professional.



inject a small amount into each tomato--take care, inject too much and the skin will split.



chill for an hour or so. serve with accompanying napkins as they can spurt alarmingly.

why, you ask, does this fit the rock and roll theme? well, it doesn't really, but it does spawn some rather rude remarks on my part and there *is* something about hypodermic needles....oh, chef kev says you can pick up a 10ml needle over the counter at your local pharmacy. this probably works everywhere except the u.s.; i work at my local d.e.a.-regulated pharmacy, and i'm telling you that even if you're nice to me, unless you have a prescription, i'm not giving you one. update: whoops. apparently you can get syringes in all but 7 states and territories. you may get hassled a bit, but you'll never know if it's because of regulations or because the pharmacist thinks you're a bit nutty for wanting to inject tomaters.

kampai!