Green Tomato Cake

I can hardly believe that June is almost half gone already! I've been working on a new project out at the farm and I've neglected to post here much this month. I'm so excited about my latest venture, the Route 52 Farm Trail but it's been very time consuming. Anyway, earlier this week Mom and I were canning some of the gorgeous San Marzano tomatoes my dad grew this year, when a summer storm hit. If you've every lived in the South, then you know that sometimes they seem to come from nowhere and are gone almost as quickly. This one was really intense for about 30 minutes and then was gone. We really needed the rain but the strong winds caused a few green tomatoes to fall off the plants. I brought them home with me and thought I fry them for dinner. I was looking in The Crescent City Farmers Market Cookbook , (in New Orleans), for a recipe when I came across this recipe for green tomato cake. Forget fried green tomatoes, cake it is! It may sound odd to put tomatoes in a cake, but green tomatoes have the texture that's similar to an apple, so they work perfectly in cake. The recipe in the cookbook didn't have a frosting, but I decided to top it with a brown butter icing. It's so good, I may be picking some more green tomatoes, just so that I can make this cake again!!

Green Tomato Cake 
Source: Kitty Hooper (Crescent City Farmers Market green tomato vendor)
Printable Recipe
Ingredients:
3 cups plain flour
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
2/3 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups chopped green tomatoes
1 cup chopped walnuts
Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Method:
In a mixing large bowl, combine flour, sugar, eggs, oil, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt; mix well. Stir in tomatoes and walnuts The mixture is very thick! Pour batter into greased and floured bundt pan and bake at 350 degrees for about 1 hour. Remove from oven and let the cake cool in the pan or cake will fall.

Serves 8-10


Browned Butter Icing
1/2 cup  butter
1 cup confectioners' sugar

After the cake has cooled and can be removed from the pan, make the frosting. In a medium saucepan over low heat, melt butter. Cook 6 to 8 minutes, or until butter is lightly browned. Whisk in confectioners' sugar until smooth. Drizzle over the cooled cake.

The brown butter icing is fantastic!

Just in case you thought I did this whole blogging thing all on my own, I do have a very faithful assistant...

My "assistant" checking for crumbs after the photos are taken.