Classic Fried Green Tomatoes

I’m so happy the woman who lived in this house before me knew what she was doing in the garden.

We moved into a fully functional, mature garden with tons of tomato plants and a producing apple tree. There’s no way I could’ve grown those from scratch. I’ve got a black thumb when it comes to gardening!

I’ve been monitoring the tomato plants for weeks. There’s one that only puts out small, grape-size tomatoes (and mostly they’re a yellow sunburst style tomato), one that hasn’t really done much of anything except produce tiny, pea-size red tomatoes, and then one that gives pretty full-size tomatoes.

I’ve been picking them off when they’re green because I absolutely LOVE fried green tomatoes.

Why fry green tomatoes? Because they’re firm and easy to fry. You can’t really fry red tomatoes because the seed sacks inside are so wet. If you’ve ever cut into a green tomato, you’ll notice how firm everything is—and those seed sacks aren’t really developed. That makes them perfect for frying.

This is a classic fried green tomato recipe, no twists or turns here. If you grew up on your grandma’s fried green tomatoes, chances are it was this exact recipe.

Enjoy!

Classic Fried Green Tomatoes

• Servings: 3-4
• Time: 20 mins
• Difficulty: Easy
• Print

A classic Southern recipe with deep-fried green tomatoes.

Ingredients

• 3-4 green tomatoes, sliced
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp. smoked paprika
• salt & pepper, to taste
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 2 TBS. milk
• 1/2 cup plain breadcrumbs
• 1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
• Vegetable oil, for frying

Directions

1. Set up your dredging station: in a small, shallow bowl, whisk together the flour, paprika, salt and pepper. In another small bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, salt and pepper. Lastly, in another small bowl stir together the breadcrumbs and cornmeal.
2. Season tomato slices with salt and pepper. Heat oil in a large, deep skillet, about 1/2″ thick from the bottom.
3. Dip tomato slices, one at a time, in flour mixture to coat. Dredge in egg wash, then roll in breadcrumb mixture until well coated.
4. Fry in hot oil until golden brown on both sides, about 2-3 minutes. Serve fried green tomatoes with ranch dressing.