Ripe and red, fresh and juicy, small or big, long or round. In all different shapes and sizes, tomatoes are seen in abundance during the sunny season; picked off the vine, poured into markets and finally placed into the baskets of hungry Italians, eagerly awaiting to dish out and tuck into tomato-heavy lunchtime spreads.

Italy’s sheer quantity of these sweet and sour culinary delights is enough to tantalise your taste buds, have your eyes out on stalks, and even make you pity the lonesome carrots and rejected runner beans shied behind their mighty mounds at the vegetable stands. Yet the vast quantity of tomatoes has nothing on their scrumptious quality. At your first bite of an Italian summer tomato, matured to sun-kissed perfection, you’ll be on the floor, begging for more.