tomatoes | Stacking Functions Garden

January 31, 2012
by Jennifer 2 Comments

Garden Plan 2012

Time for my favorite post of the year: my garden plan is complete! Check it out:

DETAILS (let’s start with the stock tanks, shall we?):

Stock tanks
Inspired by Eliot Coleman, I’m going to try and get multiple harvests out of 2 of my 3 tanks this year. I’ll start some lettuce and greens seeds indoors in a few weeks, then plant them out in March or early April in some (brand new not yet built) hoop houses. Then I will probably just grow more heat-tolerant greens during the hot part of summer, followed by a fall planting of spinach and carrots in high hopes of a Christmastime harvest. We shall see! The stock tank in the top of the plan that lists herbs is in a shadier spot than the other two, so I’ll plant accordingly there.

Deck area
I want to possibly try Feverfew, an herb with medicinal use that has cute flowers. I’ve heard it repels bees (?!) so the deck would be a perfect spot. I’m also bringing back zucchini after a 2-year absence (check out my summer 2009 gardening posts for zucchini ridiculousness). Just one hill this time! Also a hill of watermelon using seeds that we saved from a really cool orange-fleshed watermelon last summer.

Tomatoes
I’m going to try something new with tomatoes this year, too. Also inspired by Eliot Coleman’s book as well as a couple of friends’ gardens, I’m going to try training tomatoes up on twine hanging down from a structure like so:

This is my friend Brian’s tomato jungle. A fellow master gardener that I know also has a system along these lines. I’m hoping to get a higher yield this way — more plants, pruned down to their central stem. No more bushy tomatoes in giant, tipsy cages.

Cabbage/green beans/fennel
I didn’t plan enough room for cabbage last year, so I’ve tried to be more realistic this year (note that the circles are significantly larger). We’re going to try Napa cabbage this year. Also, moving fennel back into the garden because it simply does not grow well in part-shade, no matter how hard I wish for it.

Leeks/basil/banana peppers/shallots
I’ve never grown leeks or shallots before, and Adam requested both. Really, this year is all about satisfying Mr. Gourmet Cook. I will always grow sweet banana peppers because they are hands-down my favorite pickled food.

Garlic/parsnips/bunch o’ herbs
I struggled to come up with something to plant in between my rows of garlic, which will be harvested by mid-July. It had to be something that started *VERY* slowly — why, parsnips of course! Parsnips and I are back together for 2012.

Trellises
I found some softball-size heirloom melons that are supposed to be trellis-able, so I’m trying those as well as cucumbers and peas.

Garden planning and seed starting information

My garden plans for 2009, 2010, and 2011
Starting seeds without peat or plastic
U of M Extension seed starting guide
U of M Extension: planting dates for vegetables (highly recommended)
U of M Extension: a whole bunch more information about vegetables

August 12, 2011
by Jennifer 1 Comment

Vine-ripened tomatoes

Green zebra tomatoes - a little trickier to know when these are ready!

A neighbor asked me recently when was the best time to pick tomatoes. In the past, I always left mine on the plant until they were very ripe. Recently, I’ve been picking them sooner.

Last year we visited Natura farm and learned that CSA farms pick tomatoes a bit sooner than fully ripe. Generally, vine-ripened means the tomato has started to ripen on the vine. This allows growers to ship when the tomato is still somewhat hard, and deliver it to consumers just as it reaches perfection. Makes sense. The farmer I spoke with said there’s little to no difference in flavor between partially vine-ripened and fully vine-ripened.

So how do you define partially vine-ripened? My definition: the tomato is starting to turn red. It might not be fully, bright red, but it’s more red than green. You can see there’s a range of colors that fit this description:

Of course some of these pictured are yellow ‘blondkopfchen’ cherry tomatoes, which often do end up being fully ripe before I pick them because they ripen fast (they get eaten fast, too).

If you, like me, are cursed with squirrels eating your tomatoes just as they reach perfection, here’s one solution — pick the tomatoes a few days early and let them ripen on your counter top.

Those green zebras at the top were tricky — I’ve never grown them before so I wasn’t sure what their final color actually is (I could have just googled it). But Tracey, you were right: they are absolutely delicious.

One final word: never refrigerate tomatoes–home-grown or store-bought. They lose flavor in the fridge. Even the Washington Post agrees with me on this one.

This just in: apparently storing tomatoes stem-side down makes them last much longer. (Thanks Laura!)

August 1, 2011
by Jennifer 3 Comments

Garlic and squirrel war

Here’s the garlic, all cleaned up and tied into a nice, neat (huge) bunch:

Thank goodness the garlic turned out, because everything else has been rather uninspiring. Here’s yesterday’s harvest:

Those turnips were rather small and woody. I did not thin them out enough. Turnips: easy to grow but need a lot of room. Then there’s this:

My biggest, most beautiful “Big Rainbow” heirloom tomato, only days from being picked: attacked by squirrels. This is war. Adam was looking at wrist rockets and blow guns online today. How do you combat squirrels?

July 25, 2011
by Jennifer 1 Comment

Garden update, late July

My garden is out of control. Huge behind-schedule work project + a handful of weekend getaways, and Adam has been busy with another project (you’ll find out about that soon enough). This is for posterity so I better be honest…

Here’s a view from standing on top of a chair, on the deck looking east. I love how the pumpkin and squash plants now totally dwarf the rainbarrel, the deck, the fence, and the potato tower.

Tomatoes are oh-so-close. We’ve eaten a handful of stupices and a few blondkopfchen — both are quite small and early. The blondkopfchen is the crazy one with the halo of blooms on top, on the left. After Aug. 1 I will probably start pinching off new blossoms, since there’s no point.

Lacinato kale, carrots, a cabbage in the back behind the overgrown chamomile. The kale came back beautifully from my earlier cabbage worm troubles.

Beets, turnips, celeriac, parsley, and such. It’s about time to do another beet & turnip harvest and thin these out more. Adam pulled one celeriac to see if it was ready and it most decidedly was not. It was just a mass of tiny roots, which makes me wonder whether the others will work out or not.

Variety peppers and cucumbers in the background (encroaching pumpkins/squash on the left). I need to start picking and pickling, really soon. We’ve eaten a few of each fresh.

Here’s another overview, to give you a good view of the bean trellises. In the middle is “Cherokee Trail of Tears” — a bean you can eat fresh or dried. I finally picked two tonight — my bush beans at my community garden plot have been producing beans for over two weeks. I wasn’t aware that pole beans take so much longer. The Christmas Lima Beans, on the right trellis, have so far produced 0 pods. Plenty of blooms, though. I’m not giving up hope yet.

So did anything look different? Did things look maybe a little less crowded? That’s because we pulled out all the garlic about a week ago:

We dried it in the sun for about an hour then moved it into the garage to cure. It’s just about done, so this weekend we’ll clean it up further and move it inside and see how long we can make it last.

Our backyard prairie/native garden is also starting to take shape! We need one more stock tank (ahem, Dad), then we’ll fill in the areas around them with natives. We transplanted 4 milkweeds from a field near Adam’s parents’ house and less than 12 hours later we saw a very excited monarch butterfly in the back yard. That was fast!

July 14, 2011
by Jennifer 2 Comments

High season

IT’S HERE! Raspberry Season 2011!

Oh those first few pickings are always the best — huge berries, plumped up even bigger by a nice rainfall this morning. We’ve now arrived at the time of the year where if you go into the garden, you might as well bring a basket along. Here’s a picking from earlier this week:

Some small turnips, tiny beets, and three stupice tomatoes, which Anneke immediately ate after I snapped this. See the impatient smile on her face? That girl LOVES baby tomatoes. We cooked and ate the turnip and beet greens, too. There was also this:

After picking off MANY slugs, we turned this into cole slaw, which even the kids ate enthusiastically. Now considering renaming this blog “cute kids with garden produce.”

June 16, 2011
by Jennifer 6 Comments

Garden update, mid-June

It’s the middle of June already! Time to check in on the edibles around the yard.

Things are coming along swimmingly in the garden. Dare I say it? Best garden year ever?! It might be a bit soon, I better not jinx myself. Look at the pumpkin, squash, and potato tower in the foreground! Happy to report that rabbits do not seem interested in pumpkin or squash plants. [phew]

The Tom Thumb peas that the kids planted back in April (see picture at the top of the page) are finally just about ready. They are in a part-shade spot, and I don’t think they get *quite* enough sunshine to have reached their full potential. But we’ll get one solid meal, anyway.

Rowan’s garden, with a couple of radishes left and some rather pathetic-looking “Gourmet Lettuce Mix” from High Mowing Organic Seeds. We had a couple of hot days. Also, I should have thinned a bit more. I am going to give this another 7-10 days and if things don’t look better, I’m ripping it all out and planting some quick-growers that we could harvest before fall: turnips, radishes, and maybe some kale.

Anneke’s garden, on the other hand, is looking spectacular. We planted it with a 50/50 mixture of Burpee Organic Mesclun mix and rainbow chard. I’ve thinned it quite a few times, adding the baby greens to our salad bowl as we go. I don’t know if this mix is more heat tolerant than the other, but I think it has a greater variety of lettuce types. The arugula we thinned out and ate early on; it’s gone now. All that remains are the hardier greens and lots of chard, filling in nicely.

Bees are hard at work to give us raspberries in a few weeks.

Alpine strawberries are loaded with fruit. Picking and eating immediately, every single day for about a week now.

Regular strawberries are just getting going — picked the first actual bowl full tonight.

Anneke was kind enough to stop eating strawberries long enough for me to shoot a quick comparison shot — alpine strawberries are tiny! The strawberry on the right is a standard size, like what you’d get at a pick-you-own farm (note: still smaller than grocery store strawberries). If making jam is your thing, you’d better plant 500 alpine strawberry plants and plan to spend your entire day picking. Rather, alpines are great for eating fresh, especially when you have a part-shade situation. Regular strawberries will not produce much at all in part-shade, but alpines will.

Blueberries! I pinched off most of the flowers on this plant, because it’s still so young, but I had to keep at least a small handful of berries for my efforts.

Tomatoes. Absolutely mental. Could this be the year when I finally have a good tomato crop? Could it? Pretty please?

Cabbage area. Lots of things going on here: two cabbages, chamomile, rosemary, kale, carrots, garlic on either side, a sage in the back, and chrismas lima beans climbing the trellis to the right. Didn’t have great carrot sprouting rates, hence the couple of semi-bare areas. Look at how free of insect damage my cabbages are. Unbelievable, considering the cabbage worms I dealt with last summer. Could it be that surrounding my cabbages with herbs and garlic confounded them? Hard to say for sure.

This area looks like total chaos but it’s actually quite nicely ordered according to my plan. It includes: golden beets, red beets, turnips, celeriac, parsley, rosemary, and some nice green pole beans climbing the trellis in the back to the right.

Finally, the peppers and eggplant, with cuke plants finally reaching up toward their trellis at the back. Everything is kinda slow-moving in this area so far, so I hope growth rates pick up.

OK, that’s it! Lots going on here!

March 14, 2011
by Jennifer 2 Comments

Recipe: Grass-fed barbacoa

I have a Chipotle weakness. Adam made his own slightly healthier version of their barbacoa tonight. Here’s his recipe:

Adam’s Barbacoa
1.5 lbs grass-fed beef short ribs
3 T. neutral oil for frying
3 c. stock (beef or chicken is fine)
1 c. canned tomatoes, with liquid
1 onion
4 cloves garlic, crushed
3 tsp. chili powder
3 tsp. cumin
1 tsp. oregano
salt & pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 400 degrees (F). Season the short ribs with salt & pepper on both sides. Heat oil in Dutch oven over med-hi heat. Sear meat on both sides, remove meat from pan. Add onion to pan. When the onions start to soften, add the garlic and spices. Stir for a minute or two, then add stock and tomatoes and bring to a simmer. Taste, then add salt & pepper and more spices accordingly. Add the meat back in, then place the cover on the Dutch oven and bake at 400 degrees for 90 minutes, checking after 60-70 minutes to make sure it’s not too dry. (You could add a bit more stock if it seems dry.) Pull meat apart with a fork.

We ate this on sprouted-grain corn tortillas with grated cheese, simple guacamole, and lacto-fermented banana peppers. And home-brewed beer! So good, the kids asked for 2nds and 3rds (not of beer, silly).

February 2, 2011
by Jennifer Leave a comment

Garden plan 2011: a CSA replacement

Last year, we had a CSA box every week from June-October. As a result, my 2010 garden focus was growing larger amounts of only a few vegetables in my garden, with the idea that we would eat the CSA produce and preserve the garden produce. It worked pretty well– we’re still stocked with kraut, pickles, and pickled peppers. But I get bored easily, so new year, new plan. We’re cancelling our CSA this year, and we’ll grow a greater variety. I also have a bunch of old seeds that I’d like to use up. (Yes, you can re-use old seeds.)

Here’s the tentative plan (click to enlarge):

Once again, I’m hoping to get some trellises built this spring. We actually have a plan and materials on hand this time, so it shouldn’t be a problem.

Also: I’m adding some raised beds/very large containers in the backyard that will likely hold a few more veggies such as chard, radishes, and lettuce, and I also plan to construct a potato tower back there somewhere. I will post more about the backyard plans later, as they take shape.

New for 2011:

I’ve never grown carrots before. Weird, huh? The kids will really get a kick out of them.
Trying a “garlic border” around each of my plant areas. Hoping it will keep the cabbage worms away. (Ha!)
Expanding the number of herbal tea plants I grow. I’ve become really addicted to peppermint, chamomile, and raspberry leaf teas from my yard.
The aforementioned potato tower!
I will not be growing parsnips. We’re officially on a break. (Shocking, yes?)
I saved seeds from a promising-looking pumpkin and squash that I picked up at the farmer’s market last fall to use for my one small hill of each. We’ll see how that goes…
I’m starting my few cabbage and celeriac plants indoors. I tried to do a “scatter planting” of them very early last spring and it didn’t work well at all. It took them forever to sprout, and by that time the bed was full of weeds. Just a mess in general, and I never did see a celeriac. I’d rather set out plants and know what I’m dealing with. I also had to move the cabbages around a lot as they got bigger. The whole thing was really kinda dumb — fortunately I did get several nice heads of cabbage out of it in the end.
I’ll start a couple of peppers and tomatoes, but I’m going to buy the rest at the annual Friends School Plant sale, since they usually have a really great selection of both and I’m going to it anyway.
Speaking of the Friends Sale, I’m hoping to pick up some native plants and start my evil master plan of converting the boulevard on my entire city block to native grasses and wildflowers instead of boring old grass. Watch out, neighbors. More on that in a future post as well!

Update, Feb. 4, 2011: Forgot to note that I’m moving my tomato plants to a new spot this year. I put tomatoes in the same spot for ’09 and ’10, and it was not a good idea. I got very few tomatoes in ’10. So I’m trying the pumpkins and winter squash and crossing my fingers that the rabbits will not be interested in them (that area is outside the fence).

October 21, 2010
by Jennifer 1 Comment

Recipe: green tomato ketchup

Every year, I get obsessed with one food, and I make ridiculous amounts of that one thing. 2009 was the year of sauerkraut. This year, it was ketchup. We made Mark Bittman’s red ketchup recipe several times. We canned some, and froze some.

We haven’t had a frost here yet (which is unusually late) but not much was happening anymore out in the garden so I cleaned it all up last weekend. Then I decided to try Bittman’s green ketchup recipe as a way to use up all those tiny green tomatoes. Result: DELICIOUS. Here’s how to do it — it takes a couple of hours, but much of that time is barely-attended cooking time.

Green Ketchup
6 c. chopped green tomatoes
A handful of peppers, de-seeded and chopped — sweet or hot, whatever you like. I used 6-7 banana peppers.
1 large onion, chopped
1 stalk celery or 1 leek, chopped (optional)
1-3 cloves garlic, peeled & crushed
3/4 c. apple cider vinegar
2 T. pickling spice
2 T. olive oil
1/2 c. brown sugar
salt, pepper, & green or red Tabasco sauce to taste

1. Put the vinegar and pickling spice in a small saucepan and heat to boiling, then remove from heat and set aside.

2. Heat the oil in a large pot over medium heat. Fry the onion, celery and peppers until soft, adding the garlic at the last minute and cooking for just another minute or two longer.

3. Add the tomatoes, along with a generous cup of water. Continue to cook over medium heat, stirring regularly until the tomatoes start to break down and the mixture starts to get bubbly. At that point you can reduce the heat to very low and just let it simmer for a very long time, at least 1/2 hour, stirring occasionally. If it seems like it’s getting dry, go ahead and add a bit more water as needed.

4. Strain the pickling spices out of the now-cool vinegar and add the vinegar to the tomatoes. Stir in the sugar. Use an immersion blender to break up the few remaining chunks. Taste. Adjust seasoning. Cook another half hour or until desired ketchup consistency is reached. I’m impatient, so our ketchup is a little on the thin side compared to store-bought, but the kids have not complained at all.

There it is, the final harvest. Just over a quart (total) of green ketchup, and one final quart of pickles. I didn’t feel like breaking out the canner, so we froze this ketchup.

*Recipe variation: Bittman’s recipe actually calls for 4 c. chopped green tomatoes and 2 c. chopped tart apples. This also sounds very yummy. I had 6 c. of green tomatoes to use up, so I decided to be lazy and skip the apples.

October 21, 2010
by Jennifer 2 Comments

BPA and canned tomatoes

Sorry for the light posting schedule lately; as it turns out, having two full-time working adults in a family really cuts into blogging time. ANYWAY.

I posted in August about our crazy weekend of canning tomatoes. Because we buy organic tomatoes, and because our CSA delivers them right to our door, we save very little money canning our own tomatoes vs. buying canned tomatoes at the store. So why go through the effort? One reason: BPA.

Bisphenol-A, which many different plastic products contain, has been shown to have some worrisome side effects, especially on fetuses and children, because it mimics the hormone estrogen. Canada was recently the first country to declare it toxic. (Has Canada ever considering annexing Minnesota? I’d be all for it.)

The United States’ own FDA is also concerned, but I am skeptical that they will ever do anything beyond encouraging industries to try and find a replacement. (They prefer to merely ask them, really, really nicely.)

The big brouhaha a couple years back with BPA was its use in infant bottles and linings of infant formula cans — many of those brands now offer BPA-free alternatives. But what many people didn’t realize was just how prevalent this stuff is — nearly any can of food that you buy in the grocery store is lined with BPA. Even store receipts are printed on BPA-coated paper!

Some applications of BPA are probably worse than others. Canned tomatoes are very acidic. Canned garbanzo beans, not so much. Yet, right now none of the organic canned tomatoes for sale at my co-op are in BPA-free cans. The only glass-jarred tomato products are the strained tomatoes and tomato paste from Bionaturae. (And those travel all the way from Italy, good grief.)

Here’s another thing to consider: even home-canning is not perfect, because the lids of canning jars are also coated with BPA. But I’m taking a “less harm” approach here — the tomatoes, as they sit on my shelf for the next few months, are not in contact with the lid at all. So it’s not perfect, but still better. Right? I hope so, because that was a lot of work.

Update, Nov. 8, 2010: Here’s yet another article that I came across this morning. Basically, a consumer group found unacceptable BPA levels in a bunch of different foods. Two things to note: this article is one year old. The U.S. is still only requiring “voluntary” efforts from the food industry.

Update II, Nov. 30, 2010: Now a new study looks at BPA’s effect on adult immune systems. The study also looked at triclosan’s correlation with allergies in children. Triclosan is another common chemical found in all sorts of things (such as anti-microbial soaps).

Update III, April 4, 2011: Yet another study. This one measured BPA in people’s urine; after only three days of switching to a diet of freshly-prepared organic food, they dropped 66% on average!

The cooks were instructed to avoid contact with plastic utensils, and nonstick cookware and foods had to be stored in glass containers with BPA-free plastic lids. Researchers even told food preparers not to overfill the containers so the food wouldn’t touch the plastic lid.

Microwaving in plastic was out; so was using coffee makers with plastic parts. Coffee drinkers got their morning coffee from French presses or ceramic drip models.

I switched to French Press quite some time ago, but didn’t even think about the plastic implications. I did it for the taste, naturally. Anyway, check out this study, the most convincing one yet, in my opinion.