Savor the Southern classic with our irresistible fried green tomatoes recipe! Fresh, tangy green tomatoes are sliced thick, coated in flour or cornmeal, and fried to golden perfection. Fried green tomatoes is a great recipe to use all of those green tomatoes at the end of the garden season!
If you go through all of the work to grow a garden you want to use every little thing that comes out of it. Sometimes old man Frost creeps up and tries to destroy it before it is finished growing all of those lovely fruits and veggies. Here is a way to beat him at his own game and use up every bit of that garden. Fried green tomatoes are so good and you don’t have to wait to take a trip down South to have some.
PrintFried Green Tomatoes Recipe
- Yield: 4-6 servings
Ingredients
2 quarts water
2 Tbsp. salt
4-6 medium green tomatoes, unpeeled and sliced
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup vegetable oil or bacon grease
salt (to taste)
Instructions
- Mix the salt and water in a mixing bowl.
- Soak the sliced tomatoes in the salt water mixture for 30-40 minutes.
- Drain.
- Place the flour in a bag, like a cereal bag or ziploc bag.
- Heat the oil in a large skillet.
- Drop the tomato slices a few at time into the bag. Shake thoroughly to coat.
- Carefully place the slices into the hot oil. Brown until crisp on both sides.
- Salt to taste.
Notes
- You can also use squash, zucchini or eggplant in place of or with the green tomatoes.
- You don’t have to soak them in the salt water first if you’re in a hurry. Some green tomatoes can start out bitter and soaking in salt water first removes the bitterness.
- If you prefer, you can use cornmeal to make the crust instead of flour. To do that, whisk an egg in a bowl and place the cornmeal into a bag or bowl instead of flour. Dip the tomato slices in the egg, and then place in the cornmeal to coat them and then fry as usual.
- If you use an egg, it serves as a binder so that the cornmeal sticks better.
- For a nice addition to the flavor, try adding a half cup of finely grated Parmesan cheese to the flour when breading them.
From A Reader:
Hi Tawra, I love your site!
You may want to try a trick my mother taught me about fried green tomatoes. After slicing the tomatoes, place them in a single layer on paper towels or a microwave safe plate. Microwave on high for 4 minutes. Cool until able to handle them and proceed as usual.
This allows you to fry them at a higher temperature, which speeds up the cook time (saving power) and keeps the tomatoes from soaking up as much oil.
Nan S.
This Fried Green Tomatoes Recipe is from our Dining On A Dime Cookbook, Volume 1.
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Rose I don’t think it will change the taste too much. I think the egg is really more of a binder to hold the crust together. There are a lot of batter recipes I have used and just haven’t put the egg in it for what ever reason and I couldn’t tell a difference so you might try it without and see.
Rose you might want to reread the article too because I just up dated it with a faster way to make them from a tip of one of our readers.
Love fried Green Tomatoes! Thanks for recipes. : )
I use corn meal instead of flour. Makes the tomatoes real crispy on the outside.
Just bought some green tomatoes the other day – thanks for the “reminder” recipe.
We don’t often have green tomatoes here to fry, but as your recipe suggested, this can be done with zucchini. I have never soaked my zucchini in cold water first, but fried zucchini is a seasonal summer treat for us. My tip is to fry in equal amounts of salad oil, and butter or margarine. The salad oil can take a slightly higher temperature, and helps to prevent the butter from burning. Our last-of-the-season batch of zucchini we fried in bacon grease. Highly recommend it, especially since we only have this fried food during our short Canadian garden season.
Hi Jill and Tawra,
I learned how to do these many years ago from a roommate who hailed from Louisiana.
I had never heard of them before then.
He used half flour and half cornmeal to dredge them in. That is very good, too!
Thank you for your wonderful website and books!!
I LOVE Fried Green tomatoes and I guess I’ve never heard of soaking in salt water for 40 minutes. What does this do for the tomatoes? I have also used a half/half mixture of flour and cornmeal, just for extra crunch.
They can be bitter sometimes and this helps with the bitterness.
Sometimes they can be a little bitter and soaking them in the salt water helps with that. I soak my cucumbers in salt water for an hour or two sometimes because it helps with bitterness in them too.
Half flour and half cornmeal is quite delicious also.
Try adding a half cup of finely grated parmesean cheese to the flour when breading them. It is great. Also, if you have any leftover, they reheat beautifully in the oven on a ceramic/stoneware pan.