I was eating out yesterday when a big fat tomato slice arrived on my plate. My husband and I both looked at it like it was rotten. In my head I know that kitchen managers are professionals and food safety experts. Surely they must have chosen the right ones since the FDA warned everyone off raw red Roma, red plum or red round tomatoes (despite the confusing nature of the report).

We gingerly put the offending tomato off to the side, now wary of anything it touched. Unless a restaurant makes specific mention of what they're doing about the tomato situation, I don't want to see one in my meal. And if it is there, I want to be able to pick it off without contaminating any other food. Seems like a waste for restaurateurs, who are being stretched thin, to bother paying the current high tomato prices if the food goes to waste because they don't explain what they've bought.

Back when the FDA made its announcement 145 people had gotten sick. Now the total is 228. Certainly some tomato buyers are not absorbing the information.

Restaurants and supermarkets across the country pulled tomatoes off their menus and shelves on June 9, after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration expanded its warning against a rare form of Salmonella found in red Roma, red plum, and round red tomatoes.

What better time to forego supermarket tomatoes and instead nurture your own backyard crop? Tomatoes are one of the easiest plants to care for, and you'll reap some of the sweetest rewards. It's too late to use seeds, but the perfect time for a plant since tomato plants love heat (something the country has plenty of at the moment). When choosing a tomato plant, look for a hybrid (they produce the most fruit) that's marked 'VFN,' indicating the variety is resistant to three types of diseases: verticilum wilt, fusarium wilt, and nematodes. Buy a plant without flowers and plant it deep-up to the first set of leaves. William Alexander, author of The $64 Tomato, recommends leaving the soil around the base a little below ground level to create an area for water to pool and keep the plants moist.