Among my favorite summer produce are heirloom cherry tomatoes - with intriguing names and looks to match, they never fail to please the eye or tongue. <br /> <br />I first made this galette when I was visiting my then-fiance (and now-husband of two years) at his house in Baltimore. His kitchen equipment was very limited - I'm talking no microplane, much less a grater, and a few banged up pots and baking sheets - so whenever I visited, our meals had to be rustic. Thankfully he lived near an excellent farmers' market that we loved to visit every Saturday morning, so our weekend meals, however rustic, were made with the best, freshest ingredients. I made lots of pie crusts by hand to showcase the season's fruits and took advantage of the fresh pasta from the Italian market down the block to serve as a solid backdrop for perfect produce. Nothing complicated or requiring anything beyond basic equipment, but always delicious and satisfying. <br /> <br />One weekend at the market, I came across a few pints of blackish-purple cherry tomatoes that were aptly dubbed Black Pearls. The elderly woman who ran the stall that I had come to know over the years always came up with an interesting story for her wares, and she claimed these were the Johnny Depp of cherry tomatoes. To this day, I have no idea what exactly that is supposed to mean (and if you do, please leave a comment with your explanation!), but I do know those tomatoes were phenomenal. They were sweet, juicy, and intensely tomato-y, and they were gorgeous, too. <br /> <br />And they were even better when roasted in the oven atop a flaky, buttery crust and tossed with caramelized shallots. Even if you can't get your hand on a heirloom variety, the high baking temperature caramelizes the sugars in sweet cherry tomatoes and intensifies their tomato flavor, making this an ideal preparation for perfect summer specimens and even those less-than-perfect mid-winter ones. <br /> <br /> <br />

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