I think we've hit peak tomato season here in NYC @grownyc farmers' markets. Tonight, tomatoes from several growers, olive-oiled and salted, piled onto grilled bread from Balthazar Bakery. And a side of teeny-weeny sardines in more olive oil from @little_spain.

Green beans for dinner in a stir-fry with a little ground pork, aromatics and a few things out of bottles. We never tire of these almost plausible variants on Chinese dishes. Thank you, growers who bring their wonderful produce to @GrowNYC markets.

If whitebait is on the menu, I'll order it. As I did last night at New York's Le Veau d'Or, and it was as close to perfection as a plate of whitebait can be.

One of our favorite tomato-season Chinese dinners: gingery, garlicky tomatoes boiled down to viscosity and served with rice (in this instance new-season Japanese rice. I once, maybe twice, wrote about it. Here, for example: huffpost.com/entry/cooking-o…

Farfalle (dried). Tiny dice of guanciale; onion and suggestion of garlic; zucchine; a Jimmy Nardello pepper; tomato sauce; parmesan; mixed herbs, notably mint. Olive oil, of course. @GrowNYC and other sources.

The other day we couldn't eat more than about 60 per cent of that enormous green tomato (green in color, not in ripeness, which was at its peak). So last night we had a fine dish of panzanella with plenty of mint. @StokesFarm @GrowNYC

The green one weighs 724 grams. Tomorrow we will eat tomato and bacon sandwiches (without so much as a hint of lettuce). Thank you in advance, @StokesFarm. And thank you too for growing the delicious tarragon that perfumed our omelettes this evening. @GrowNYC

Cod and sauerkraut. There were boiled new potatoes too. Sauerkraut (cooked as you like it) is a great accompaniment or cooking medium for all manner of foods beyond the expected Central/Eastern European sausages.

You'd think that our first corn of the summer would simply be gnawed off the cob with lots of butter and salt. And that would be right and proper. But this evening we had it as a stir fry with ground pork, a Jimmy Nardello pepper and a few aromatics and fermenty things. And rice.

As usual, our first local eggplants / aubergines of the season became rigatoni alla Norma. Such a great dish. @ToigoOrchards2 @norwichmeadows @SetaroPastaIT @BuonItalia_ @GrowNYC

Summer produce doesn't need to end up as a salad. This evening, we ate carrot gnocchi. For the dressing: guanciale, a banana pepper and mint. @GrowNYC

Pasta and chickpeas. An atypical version, but still .... Pasta and chickpeas. Delicious and fun.

An excellent pasta shape that captures the sauce (gomiti, meaning elbows), with greenhouse tomatoes (but surprisingly good ones), shrimp, mixed herbs, a touch of dried chili, and olive oil and lemon juice to finish. @GrowNYC @BuonItalia_

Gastronomic music-lovers / musical food-lovers: Suggestions for restaurants in Milan, not far from La Scala, that are open late enough to serve post-opera supper? I gather that the southern-Italian restaurant A Santa Lucia would be a possibility. Anything more Milanese? Thanks.

This evening, rice: a not-paella whose principal ingredients were small chickpeas and pork belly (previously cooked for another meal). The strips of pork rind, puffed up and crunchy, made a fine snack while we waited for the rice to rest.

This (apart from the handful of fava beans) is what our first-peas-of-the-season dinner usually looks like: something akin to petits pois à la française. You wouldn't know it, but a small pillowcase's worth of lettuce has collapsed into the pea mixture.

A cute label on this evening's Grüner Veltliner (drunk with re-heated pizza and some arugula salad).

Such a grand discovery: Leftover mapo tofu as a sauce for fresh-made egg noodles. We've done this a few times, and now we always make sure to make more mapo tofu than we're likely to eat in one sitting.