BBT Sandwich

As soon as I started picking ripe tomatoes from the garden I started having BBT sandwiches for lunch. When the tomatoes stop, the BBTs stop. The BBT is my version of the old standby Bacon, Lettuce, and Tomato sandwich, but I use a generous amount of chopped fresh basil instead of lettuce. Basil tastes great with a good tomato and, frankly, I think that lettuce just gets in the way. Without the lettuce all the juice from the tomato can soak into the bread so that you don't lose a drop of that summer (OK, fall) goodness.

I like to keep the BBT simple - a toasted La Brea ciabatta roll drizzled with a generous amount of extra virgin olive oil, thick sliced tomatoes from the garden sprinkled with a touch of salt (I'm enamoured of Murray River flake pink salt at the moment), a generous grind of black pepper, 4 or 5 pieces of crisp bacon, and a generous sprinkle of chopped fresh basil. Sometimes, when I'm feeling decadent, I add a bit of homemade mayonnaise. I like to hollow out the roll so that the contents don't squish out of the sandwich when you take a bite. There's quite a collection of roll guts in the freezer waiting to become bread crumbs.

September and October have been prime tomato season in my garden. I hope that the warm days continue for a few more weeks so that the lovely green fruits sizing up now have a chance to ripen.