Think of the best savory meal you’ve ever had, do you remember it?  I do, it’s this one for me.  I love love love love….(you get the point) this dish.  Seriously I love it.  Ok I’ll move on now.

A little back story on this, about 10 years ago my family was gathering for a family reunion, there are a lot of us so that is a big proposition (9 kids, I know someone should have explained the birds and the bees sooner, but I guess I should be grateful because I’m the baby).  At this particular reunion my  dad proposed a cooking contest, with a cash prize.

The entry had to be a vegetable dish, I know tomatoes are technically a fruit, but who cares they are used like veggies in cooking, right?   There were two categories, a kids dish and a best tasting dish.  Mine was voted the best tasting, but somehow magically the cash prize disappeared, funny huh?  To this day I still haven’t seen that prize money.

So I kept this little treasure in my back pocket and made it for friends and family, I had one roommate in college that would buy the ingredients every time he went grocery shopping just so I would make them again.  Worked out good for me, I love to eat them too.

So why are they so good?  Well the secret lies on your tongue, you see your tongue recognizes 5 distinct flavors.  They are: sweet, salty, sour (acidic, think lemon juice), bitter (think kale), and finally umami (savory).

Umami is a Japanese word that literally means savoriness, it is how our tongues perceive the presence of the amino acid glutamate in foods.  The presence is strong in meats, mushrooms, seaweed, cheeses, and tomatoes.

The very coolest thing about umami is the layering effects you can create with it.  By stacking two (or more) umami rich foods together you create a dish that is greater than the sum of it’s parts.  This is a super dish.  I like to think of the pizza I had a few years ago in a small shop in Venice, oh man was that umamified (I just made that word up, eat your heart out Dr. Seuss).

This dish is definitely delicious, but what about healthy?  You know it.  Tomatoes provide a great dose of Vitamins A, B3, B6, B7, B9, C, E, and K1, geesh they are a regular alphabet soup of vitamins.  Feta cheese provides a great dose of vitamin K2, which is hypothesized to help in improve bone health and reduce heart disease by directing calcium deposits out of the arteries and in to the bones where they belong. Come on calcium fall in line.

Well if you aren’t convince by now I guess I’ve failed, this little miraculous and simple recipe hits it home in the two most important categories, taste and health.  If you add its simplicity you have a perfect trifecta, so get some tomatoes and get cooking.

Recipe

Servings: 1 (just kidding it will serve 4-6 people)

Prep time: 10 min ; Cook time: 20 min

Ingredients

• 6 large Roma tomatoes
• 8 oz feta cheese
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 2 tbsp Cavender’s Greek Seasoning
• 1/4 lb Small cooked shrimp (optional)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Hollow out the tomatoes by slicing the top off and scooping with a tea spoon.

 

Blend the other ingredients together in a bowl.  If the feta is really dry add a little extra olive oil to make the mixture stick together.  Fill each tomato with the mixture.  Replace the cap and wrap in foil.  Cook for 20 minutes or until soft.

This little guys are also fantastic on the grill.  To grill, use toothpicks to secure the cap on and grill directly over hot coals until softened, best to grill standing upright if possible.  Even my friends that hate tomatoes love these.  We all have that one friend right?