Make perfect tomato pie for imperfect tomatoes with this recipe: At the table

“They’ll put hair on your chest!” was my father’s guarantee when he offered my brothers and I fresh sliced tomatoes from his garden.

Guess who refused tomatoes most of her childhood?

I now grow them myself (tomatoes, not hairs on my chest) and have found a delightful tomato pie recipe that’s bright with the taste of late summer, while its buttery crust elicits cozy fall feels. The dish is perfect for a fall picnic when cool fronts are promising to interrupt the lingering heat.

Fall tomatoes in south Louisiana are typically harvested in September and October. My kids will start talking about this tomato pie when the first green fruits set on the vines. This is when leaf-munching hornworms and juice-sucking stinkbugs start noticing tomatoes too.

Over the years I’ve discovered ways to man