Canned Tomatoes and the Myth of the San Marzano
1/13/202650 min
Canned tomatoes are a perfect winter food. As you'll know from our tomato episode, the beautiful fruits in fresh aisle of the supermarket are mostly flavorless outside of the summer season—but the tomatoes that get packed in a can are cheap, readily available, and, most importantly, delicious year-round. This episode, we have the stories of how turtle poop, full English fry-ups, and an Italian romance helped turn the canned tomato into a pantry hero. Plus, are San Marzanos really the best tasting option out there? We've got the juicy tips you need to score the ultimate tomato fix, no...
Clips
Showing 10 of 12Transcript preview
First 90 secondsJuan Rios· Guest0:02
We're gonna pull a plant right now so I can show you guys what we do every day. So you can see here, you can see some tomatoes on top, right? It looks nice, but where the real magic is, under here. That's where you really see everything.
Cynthia Graber· Host0:17
It's so nuts how many tomatoes there are.
Nicola Twilley· Host0:20
I'm really shocked.
Juan Rios· Guest0:21
You guys wanna hold it?
Nicola Twilley· Host0:23
Sure. [laughs] Oh my God.
Juan Rios· Guest0:27
It's a good workout, for sure.
Cynthia Graber· Host0:29
There's a lot of tomatoes.
Nicola Twilley· Host0:31
Wow, that weighs a ton. It's like buried treasure.
Cynthia Graber· Host0:35
Nikki and I had each hefted a massive tomato plant into the air, and we were loaded up to our elbows in bright red fruit. It was truly amazing.
Nicola Twilley· Host0:44
And what made it even more amazing was this was just two plants in a field full of them, all covered in perfect red plum-shaped tomatoes. But you could hardly see any of them until you lifted the plants up into the air. From the surface, it was just a carpet of green.
Cynthia Graber· Host1:01
We were visiting this tomato field because we promised you a full episode all about canned tomatoes. We, of course, are Gastropod, the podcast that looks at food through the lens of science and history. I'm Cynthia Graber.
Nicola Twilley· Host1:12
And I'm Nicola Twilley. And after having so much fun getting into the story of fresh tomatoes and how they lost their flavor last summer, we are back with a winter-themed take on our favorite fruit that's really more of a vegetable.
Cynthia Graber· Host1:25
What do the Civil War and Galapagos turtles have to do with the development of this pantry staple?