Thursday, August 19, 2010

Tomatoes!

We've been enjoying our large sized cherry tomatoes. They are Sweet Chelsea Cherry and I've been picking almost a pound of them each day lately. They've gone into fresh sauce, tomato & cucumber salad, fresh salsa, and been eaten out of hand. Their flavor is fine, not the most exciting but they've been all we had. They may be a little more neglected now that bigger tomatoes are on the way.
On Monday we picked the first paste tomato. A paste tomato isn't very exciting as the first large red tomato, but we used it to make a sauce with the tons of golf ball sized cherry tomatoes we've been getting. Today I picked the first two purple calabash tomatoes. They are quite beautiful and there are more on the way. We've been getting a few green zebras for a week or two, but there is something more exciting about red (or purple) tomatoes.
More purple calabash are on the way. (seed shared by Miss M).
Here are some others that will be ripening soon. Amish Paste Tomatoes have grown so tall and gotten so heavy they broke the support. First individual plants broke the twine that supported them up to the wood cross bar. I strung more twine to try to tie them back up. Then the cross bar came out of the post. We had to jerry rig it back up to support them. We lost a few green tomatoes in the process, but hopefully it will hold for the next month.
Red zebras have just a hint of color.
And then I have many unknown heirlooms. Some are just beginning to turn. I'm also seeing a bit of color of the first of my Market Miracles. I was a bit surprised that they didn't ripen sooner, as some catalogs say they are relatively fast for their size, though I got my seed from Daphne. This photo below is an unknown heirloom.
So I think that tomatoes season has finally arrived. We have about a month to enjoy the bounty before we have to worry about frosts. Bring it on!

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

The purple calabash look interesting, make sure to report out on the taste! My amish paste is also loaded with green tomatoes, I need to find a better way to grow them next year.

I had my first pineapple tomato today in a tomato and cheese sandwich, it was fab. I just love this time of year....

Emily said...

henbogle,

I'll add a comment tomorrow when I taste it. We had someone over for dinner and I wanted to both taste it and save seeds so I didn't make a mess of it in the kitchen :)

Cloud said...

I'm just loving those gorgeous heirlooms! I only have one hybrid and one heirloom this year and I'm kicking myself for not diversifying a little bit, but there's always next year!

Marcia said...

Congratulations of tomatoes!

We had company for dinner tonight too and I picked three eggplants and another goldie tomato for a great eggplant casserole.

Matron said...

I love the purple tomatoes, the flavour is amazing. My favourite is the chocolate cherry tomato. Enjoy the season while it lasts, those horrible Winter supermarket tomatoes are awful!

Daphne Gould said...

I find that Market Miracle isn't particularly quick either. It does set well in cold weather though which is good for me since I can't count on the weather.

Emily said...

The verdict on the purple calabash taste test is very good. I went ahead and saved some seeds from the first tomato. I'll save from other plants as well to make sure I have some genetic variety.

Ruth said...

WOW! Enily, I loved looking at the pictures of your harvest... remembering the "good ole days" when Charles and I loved gardening.

Nourishing Words said...

I'm really enjoying your harvest photos---beautiful. My Polish linguisa paste tomatoes also got so huge that they broke their support (twice). Most of them are about 5 to 6 inches long and a good 2 to 3 inches thick. Hefty!