In the latest Saveur, an article about Mary Sue Milliken's Thanksgiving traditions (she of The Border Grilll in Santa Monica and a long-ago cooking show called Too Hot Tamales) describes a Tomato Pudding. Essentially, it's a bread pudding made with canned tomatoes. Maybe it was the lighting, but the picture of that dish as it appeared on the family table didn't look so great to me (whoever put the mixture into the Creuset type dutch oven it baked in didn't clean up the sides or edges, so there was a lot of messy baked-on stuff, and that probably affected my opinion), but I otherwise love the sound of it: bread, olive oil, butter, onion, pecorino cheese, brown sugar, lemon juice, thyme, canned tomatoes and canned tomato puree. I've never had a tomato-only bread pudding, but it sounds like my idea of heaven.
But not on Thanksgiving, I have to admit. I can imagine a kind of pizza margarita version: melting a flew blobs of fresh mozz on top with fresh basil and a shiny coating of olive oil, and serving all by itself as a vegetarian main course or scooping to eat along side some pan fried Italian sausage (released from the casing, fork mashed into a patty).
(Karen, consider your preserved summer tomatoes for something like this!)
