Ripe and Unripe Tomatoes and a Harvest

Besides watching a seed burst out of fertile soil, or that seedling grow into a producing plant, my next favorite part is when it is finally time to pick ripe fruit and veggies. Oh, and cutting herbs like parsley and mint, or hmmm... lettuce.

Here are a few pictures of one of my harvests.  Feast your eyes!

This is the inside of my fridge after a very busy day of harvesting.  Weslee doesn't like watermelon or cantaloupe but I managed to grow a few sugar baby watermelons, a few crenshaw muskmelons (cantaloupes), and a few golden watermelons. Loving the radishes too (ready to slice and pickle!). 

Just a quick harvest before the first frost. just a quick harvest before a freeze. Notice the yellow pear tomatoes, orange slicer, and small eggplant. PLUS - our pride and joy, besides the several small orange carrots, we managed to grow 2 atomic red carrots (top of plate) and some cremey-white carrots (just under the red carrots). We also pulled up 2 tiny sweet potatoes, and two small red-bunching onions - very potent!

This is a colander of green (unripe) tomatoes I picked just after a first frost. The plants survived (barely) under two blankets and a big piece of plastic. It was too much work to try to save the plants, and I didn't have room to bring the pots inside. So I picked these to dehydrate then grind into powder. Green tomato powder is added to my all-vegg powder, and also kept separately to add depth to soups and stews. It's not very tasty by itself, and I haven't yet experimented with making green tomato preserves.

Colorful Tomatoes

One of my favorite things to grow is tomatoes.  Seeing a big bush or tall vine with colorful fruit beckoning ...  is there anything better?

I have to be careful of the acid in tomatoes but over the years, I found a few varieties that my stomach doesn't hate. The ones that seem to do well are: Yellow Pears, Kellogg's Breakfast Orange, and a tiny currant tomatoes that I can't find the name of anywhere!!

The following are a few of my favorite pics of my growing tomatoes:




Black Cherry Tomatoes and a red slicer.
I accidentally planted 2 different varieties
in one pot. Both did well.



This is a pic of one of my harvests.  Squash,
peppers, cucumber, eggplant
and, of course,, tomatoes. Yum!!



This is a tray filled with sliced yellow
mamas, yellow pears and small red
roma tomatoes

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My first dehydrator was a cheap round one but it worked.  I love my new Excelsior though!

This tray of tomatoes dried about 6-8 hours until mostly dried and barely pliable. Bagged with a dessicant package added, then placed the baggies in a tightly sealed mason jar.

Living in a small apartment with a small patio (as opposed to when I had the farmette in Colorado), I had to make some adjustments. Most of my gardening is done in pots. Does it matter? Only in regards to quantity ... but not quality.  I can still have a plant of each of my favorite low-acid tomatoes and as long as I take care of them, they will produce enough to save for the coming months AND provide some for fresh eating too.

How many of you grow tomatoes on your patio?




Recipe: Tomato Ketchup

We've been eating tomatoes from our backyard grocery garden since the last week in June. Just this past Sunday, I picked 9 beautiful red tomatoes, and there are another 5 or 6 ready for tomorrow. Now is the time to bring out the tomato recipes! Here's one for catsup / ketchup. I use apple cider vinegar to make it gluten-free.

Ingredients:
1 gallon ripe red tomatoes
2 cups vinegar (cider, wine, etc.)
1 teaspoon red pepper
3 tablespoons white table sugar
1/2 cup salt
2 tablespoons black peppercorns
2 tablespoons cloves
2 tablespoons dry mustard
3 tablespoons cinnamon
1/2 tablespoon mace

Directions:
Cut up and cook until soft a gallon of ripe red tomatoes. Pass them through a medium sieve (to get rid of big chunks of seeds or skins. In a large pot, add the cooked tomato goo, the vinegar, red pepper, sugar and salt. Then in a small cachet or cheesecloth bag, add the black peppercorns, cloves, mustard, cinnamon and mace, tie it up and add to the pot. Boil all for about 4 hours. Remove spice bag. Bottle/can while it is still hot.

Properly jarred, it should last a LONG time on your pantry shelf. I personally can't imagine my son eating chicken or fish without ketchup so it's a staple in my home.