I CAME UP ONE BATCH SHORT OF HOMEGROWN PASTE TOMATOES this year, thanks to super-dry weather, eccentric bouts of pollination-thwarting heat, and a posse of marauding chipmunks. Not bad, really, but not quite enough to fill the freezer—I needed maybe 10 more pounds. Farmer’s market to the rescue yesterday with a big bag of ‘Juliet,’ an F1 hybrid small plum that grows in grape-like clusters—a tomato I have never grown, or tasted. Ever tried it? [read more…]
tomatoes
America's favorite "vegetable" (really a fruit!), the tomato, and how to grow it from seed to harvest, including disease prevention, heirlooms versus hybrid tomato varieties, and even growing grafted tomatoes, ripening half-red ones, and making sauce.
tomato taste test: ‘juliet’ plum, farm-market find
September 19, 2010 at 10:30 am
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them chickens lay strange eggs ’round here
September 10, 2010 at 12:25 am
AND I THOUGHT I’D SEEN JUST ABOUT EVERYTHING. Do you want your tomatoes fried, scrambled, or soft-boiled?
there’s more than one way to ripen a tomato
August 25, 2010 at 12:21 am
AH, THE JUICY JOY OF A RIPE TOMATO—IF YOU CAN NURTURE ONE unscathed to that perfect shade of orangey-red, that is. This hot, dry summer the chipmunks (who demonically began taste-testing at about half-ripe) drove me to picking early and ripening every fruit indoors—which might not be such a bad thing, it turns out. To mark Week 5 of Summer Fest—Tomato Week—what better topic than how to turn a tomato red? Well, perhaps a recipe for green tomato “mincemeat,” too, just in case our magic fails? That, plus a buffet of delicious links from my Summer Fest recipe swap co-conspirators: [read more…]
tomato health check: blossom end rot, anyone?
August 2, 2010 at 5:59 pm
ACCORDING TO MY SCIENTIFIC FACEBOOK FOCUS GROUP (kidding, but four-dozen people did reply to my question about how their plants were doing) it’s generally a thumb’s-up tomato year so far. But with multiple hot, dry spells here (even though I have been watering!), I keep worrying about the dreaded blossom end rot. And here it comes—though hopefully not to stay. [read more…]
another salute to the best tomato cages ever
June 5, 2010 at 10:13 am
IT’S THE TIME OF YEAR WHEN I DRAG OUT THE TOMATO CAGES and set them into the ground where my new transplants are settling in—an exercise that used to involve disentangling a mess of inadequate but space-hogging devices that took up half the garage. Not the last few years; not since my Texas tomato cages arrived. [read more…]
tomato-troubles faq’s
May 24, 2010 at 6:58 am
Q. I am worried about another outbreak of late blight, after 2009’s epidemic. Can I do anything to prevent tomato disease?
A. Some surprising late-blight facts and tactics to try: [read more…]
why i pull out every self-sown tomato, or else
May 11, 2010 at 4:05 pm
AFTER PULLING THE FIRST FEW VOLUNTEER TOMATO seedlings just now, I thought I’d better come indoors and remind you to do the same as they occur in your garden. I know, it’s always hard to uproot “free” babies like this. I feel the pain, too. But self-sown tomatoes can carry with them the stuff of certain diseases. Out, out, damn tomato! Here’s the whole scoop, remember? (Or browse my whole topic archive about tomatoes, if you need another kind of advice.)
tomato-growing faq’s
April 14, 2010 at 11:49 am
Q. What is the difference between a determinate and an indeterminate tomato?
A. The terms refer to the growth habit of a particular variety (and there are also semi-determinates). Think of determinate and indeterminate like bush types and vine types. [read more…]
slideshow: vegetable seed-starting how-to
April 4, 2010 at 7:41 pm
INDOOR SEED-STARTING TIME IS UNDER WAY, so what better time for a simple how-to slideshow, with all the details? As you can see from the photos below, I got a new light rig (my old one, circa 1989, if just too big for me now), and I’m trying some other experiments with sowing seeds in general, and tomatoes in particular. Ready for some how-to tips? [read more…]
