RIVER CITY JOURNAL: SUMMER'S FRESH VEGETABLES WELL WORTH THE DRIVE

Who else do you know who would drive over 50 miles to find vine-ripened tomatoes that are also home-grown?

Yes, you're right.

That's what you and your wife did last Sunday. This is the time of year when gardeners throughout the area should have so many tomatoes they would be glad for someone to take them. It appears, however, that two converging forces are preventing a glut in free tomatoes:

-- First, there is a blight going around. No one seems to be real specific about what it is, but it has socked gardens everywhere.

-- Second, everyone knows this is the time for vegetable overkill, so usually generous gardeners don't think it's worth the bother.

The first produce market you came upon during the Sunday quest was overflowing with peaches, lots of sweet corn, a few onions, some hull beans and a paltry display of okra. Any tomatoes? "No," said the clerk with no explanation and a look that said, "Don't ask why." So you stocked up on sweet corn and headed out.

Fortunately, there are plenty of country roads in these parts. This means you can take a leisurely drive, see some pretty countryside and scan for roadside vegetables all at the same time. In fact, if you only get two out of three you're still in pretty good shape.

The next town boasted a sign that read "Fresh produce. Open." See, you said smugly, there was bound to be a place. But when you maneuvered the car down the alley where the sign was pointing, there was (A) no produce and (B) it wasn't open.

Guess we'll have to go to a place that always has tomatoes but is about 30 miles out of the way, you said. What the heck. It was a pleasant afternoon. A dependable air conditioner in the car can make the bright sunshine look good. Without the heat and humidity, it might just as well be October for all you know.

More roads and several turns later, you were on the highway toward the sure-fire produce Mecca. Unexpectedly there was a sign along the road promising fresh vegetables, tomatoes in particular and Sunday hours.

Sure enough, an amiable woman came to assist, and pretty soon you had a fair supply of tomatoes, some freshly dug potatoes and a good-sized eggplant. Some quests, it turns out, are actually worth the effort.

The next night dinner was grilled eggplant that had been marinaded for 24 hours, sweet corn that was a mix of white and yellow varieties and a mound of sliced tomatoes. This is what fine summer dining is meant to be.

You couldn't help but remember the late-summer gardens on the farm in Kelo Valley in the Ozark hills. The hot days of August are when gardens have either succeeded or failed. If successful, it is canning time. If not, let the weeds have it. For some reason, every farm garden had enough tomato plants to feed an invading army. No matter how many you ate (sometimes like an apple standing in the garden with juice dripping off your elbow) or canned or gave away, there were plenty left to feed the hogs or throw away. The next year hundreds of tomato plants would sprout everywhere you hurled tomatoes at wasps, at clods of dirt, at clumps of weeds and at the okra plants. This was before you decided okra tasted pretty good.

Your mother used to make what she called Garden Leftovers Stew. It consisted primarily of tomatoes, corn, okra, onions and green peppers, and she cooked it in a big cast-iron skillet. It would simmer most of the day with the smell of hot vegetables mingling in the kitchen air while summer slipped toward the annual milestone of First Day of School.

It is probably those memories that make you drive so far on a Sunday afternoon to buy vegetables.

~R. Joe Sullivan is the editor of the Southeast Missourian.