Fried Green Tomatillos

Source:  Sunny Anderson

1/2 c sour cream
1/2 c Greek yogurt
1/4/ c honey
hot sauce to taste

6 green tomatillos
1 c flour
1 c buttermilk
salt
pepper
1 c plain breadcrumbs
1c cornmeal
garlic powder
chili powder
fresh thyme

Sauce:  mix all ingredients together.

Tomatillos:  Slice tomatillos 1/2 " thick.  Lay them on a plate and season both sides with salt.  Let rest 10 minutes.  Pat dry with papertowels.
Combine flour and pinch of salt in a shallow dish.  Pour buttermilk into second shallow dish.  In third shallow dish, add breadcrumbs, cornmeal, garlic powder, salt, chili powder and salt.  Dredge tomatillo slices in flour.  Shake off excess.  Dip slices in buttermilk, then press both sides in cornmeal mixture.
Pour enough oil into a large saute pan to coat the bottom.  Heat over medium heat until oil begins to shimmer.  Fry coated tomatillo slices in batches, taking care not to crowd the pan, 2-3 minutes on each sides.

ingredient note:  You can get tomatillos at most grocery stores.  They sort of look like green tomatoes.  But.  As all of us who have ever watched Food Network know,  tomatillos are not related to tomatoes.  In fact, they are related to gooseberries.  They look pretty neat with their papery husks.  I found my tomatillos slightly sticky inside the husk.

 This is what a tomatillo looks like.  Pretty cool looking, huh?

And this is what they look like slice.  See, not related to the tomato.

Ever since I saw the movie Fried Green Tomatoes, I've been intrigued by recipes of this sort.  My dislike for tomatoes has stopped me every making it before. The fact that this recipe uses tomatillos (which look like freaky alien berries) just clinched it for me. I had to try it!

The recipe is fairly straightforward.  I always make a disaster with breading -- my fingertips end up wearing little dough"covers", there is flour everywhere -- it's a mess.  Also, I my ratio of cornmeal to breadcrumbs was 1 to 3 (third of a cup of cornmeal to one cup of breadcrumbs) -- instead of half and half.  I don't care for the texture of a cornmeal crust, so I wanted to downplay that.  The whole frying is always a disaster for me too -- the smell of oil, hot oil blah blah blah  (would be so much easier with a deep fryer, but I refuse to get that kind of temptation into my home).  So the recipe makes a mess.

The crust is crispy and flaky and perfect.  Once you bite into these you'll never doubt again that the tomatillos are related to gooseberries.  They are extremely tart.  The dipping sauce is PERFECT for this.  I thought that the 1/4 c of honey was an overkill -- you need every bit of sweetness.  And the heavy creaminess of the sauce is also great to balance out the acidity of the tomatillos.

And below is a picture of my daughter enjoying them: