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Backyardnotes

~ All things botanical in photos and words—in my West Seattle garden and elsewhere; seeing and creating art and assorted musings.

Backyardnotes

Category Archives: Tomatoes

SAVING SEEDS FOR THE NEXT SEASON

05 Monday Jan 2015

Posted by backyardnotes in Fun in the Garden, Gardening, Harvest, Plant Crazy, Tomatoes, Vegetable garden

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bean seed, onion seed, planting, saving, Saving seeds, Seeds, tomato seed, tomato seeds

Dried Lazy Housewife pole bean seed

Dried Lazy Housewife pole bean seed

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

AS ANOTHER YEAR ROLLS IN there is no better time to begin dreaming about and planning this year’s vegetable garden. Seed saving for me started about twenty-two years ago. Even though the seeds were some type of F1 hybrid (called La Roma) and unlikely to come true, I saved them anyway. The plants from the saved seed were just fine and the tomatoes were successively better each year, farther away from the parent. I still grow these tomatoes, although I no longer am using the original saved seeds.

As mentioned in previous posts, I often let some lettuces, herbs, leeks, and other greens go to seed, then shake the seed around the vegetable garden; the seeds come up on their own schedule; when the new plants are large enough I thin and transplant them into vegetable beds (except for cilantro and dill, which do not like to be disturbed).

Rattlesnake pole bean, green stage

Rattlesnake pole bean, green stage

I have been saving some bean seed the last few years, mostly pole beans. I really like Lazy Housewife, a great pole bean that was from Seed Savers (found at flower and garden show several years back). I also have become fond of Rattlesnake, a good green snap bean and shell-bean. This year I let a lot of beans go to dry seed stage rather than pull them out when the vines started to die back.

 

Rattlesnake beans drying on the vine

Rattlesnake beans drying on the vine

The last stage of harvesting

The last stage of harvesting

Rattlesnakebeans_2

 

Leek seedhead

Leek seedhead

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pollination in action!

Pollination in action! Walla Walla onion seed to follow!

I have always let some leeks go to seed as the seed stalks are tall and the seed heads large and showy, an easy ornamental as well as a tasty vegetable! I also like growing my own Walla Walla sweet onions, but had never saved the seed. In the fall of 2013 I reset some small, unharvested onions so they would set seed the following summer.

Dried seedheads

Dried seedheads

When the onions had ‘bloomed’ and set seed I left the seed heads to mature then cut the tops and set them in a cool, dry and shady spot until the seeds separated easily from their husks. Not very scientific but it worked just fine.

Walla Walla onion seed

Walla Walla onion seed

I was rewarded with more seed than I could possibly plant in my small, limited space garden and I shared some seed with my neighbors. Walla Walla’s are long-day onions, perfectly suited to our long, Northwest summer days and suggested planting is late August. The seedlings were up within two weeks of sowing and are perfectly hardy through our normally temperate weather and sporadic freezing we often have around here; I usually transplant the seedlings in mid-to late February and harvest onions in June and July.

Lots of onion seed and plenty to share!

Lots of onion seed and plenty to share!

BACK TO THE TOMATO SEEDS. In the 1990’s Taunton Press published Kitchen Garden magazine, to which I subscribed until they unfortunately ceased publication. However, in one issue there was an article about saving tomato seed and I have followed the procedure ever since and with good success; the method goes like this:
Remove the seeds from the ‘jelly’ that holds them in place. Place in a shallow container and cover with water. Let the seeds stand until they start to ferment and the water acquires a moldy top layer.

The fermenting, moldy seed

The fermenting, moldy seed

At that point, gently pour off the water and layer of mold; most of the ‘jelly’ has now loosened and separated from the seed; all of the good seeds will stay at the bottom of the container and everything else slips out. Add clean water, gently drain once more and add more water to cover the seed; let stand another day or two then rinse and drain off the water leaving the seeds to dry in the container.

After fermentation

After fermentation

The fermented and dried tomato seeds

The fermented and dried tomato seeds

I may be leaving out something here, and I don’t recall the reason for the fermentation or know the science behind it, but I do know that I have successfully saved tomato seed this way for a very long time. I wish I had saved the article; it is one of the few things not to be found in the vast depths of the internet. But I have thought that tomato seeds that end up in the compost heap go through a similar kind of fermentation and there is never a lack of volunteer tomatoes in my garden beds.

Finished seed for next year

Finished seed for next year

Tomatoseeds_2

At least a few new varieties to save every year

As the seed catalogs begin to arrive, my thoughts are turning to spring planting and the promise of juicy tomatoes, sweet onions and the first pickings of snap beans.

 

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TOMATO SEED BANDIT

13 Saturday Apr 2013

Posted by backyardnotes in Food, Growing, Legacy plants, Seeds & Seed Starting, Tomatoes

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Berkley Tye Dye tomato, nature, plants, seed starting, tomato seedlings, tomato thieves, tomatoes

TomSeedlingsTOMATO SEED UPDATE! ONE DAY, during the last week of April my daughter came to work in the greenhouse and the SEEDS HAD MIRACULOUSLY APPEARED! Even though it was quite late in the game to be starting tomato seeds she planted them anyway and delivered 12 plants (about 6 inches tall) to me on Sunday. One of each variety. HURRAY! My faith in humanity has been restored!

THERE WILL BE NO TOMATO STARTS HERE THIS YEAR. I’m sad about it too. My oldest daughter works in a college greenhouse part-time while finishing her degree program. This year I offered to loan my tomato seeds to the grow program in return for starts. I have saved seeds from many varieties since the early nineties and subsequent generations of them. I save seed from the varieties that have been tasty and performed well in the temperamental and unpredictable northwest summers. I have saved seed from tomatoes bought at farmer’s markets, produce stands, plants I have bought and grown, etc., and most were heirloom types.

ALAS, no starts because some light-fingered jerk on the grounds crew lifted the entire bag of seeds from the potting bench before some of them could be planted and the seeds and starts returned to me. A theft like that is baffling to me. COULDN’T YOU JUST ASK FOR SOME OF THE SEEDS?!

HOWEVER, this gives me a chance to visit Christianson’s Nursery, one of my favorite nurseries. Located among glorious fields of tulips in the Skagit Valley, they have a great selection of tomato plants. One of the plants I bought last year was a variety new to me: Berkley Tye-dye Heart. A big beefstake type with a red and green center. So good, I saved seed!

Berkley Tie Dye

Berkley Tie Dye, green stage

A ripened Berkley Tie Dye tomato, streaked with green.

A ripened Berkley Tie Dye tomato, streaked with green.

So, this year I will be on the lookout for new and tasty varieties and order new seeds next year of old favorites. Life marches on.

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SURPRISE—NOT A PUMPKIN AFTER ALL; GOODBYE, TOMATOES

19 Friday Oct 2012

Posted by backyardnotes in Fall, Fun in the Garden, Tomatoes, Vegetable garden

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fall, goodbye tomatoes, green tomato salsa, lettuce seeds, pumpkins, squash vine, surprise squash, vegetable garden, volunteer plants

Sure doesn’t look like a pumpkin!

THIS VOLUNTEER SQUASH VINE has turned into a monster in my small vegetable garden and it turns out not to be a pumpkin plant, but more like delicata squash. No matter, as it will soon be a mere remembrance of a generous experiment in curiousity.

Red oakleaf lettuce seeds, like little fairies waiting to take flight. Probably 6-8 generations away from original planting.

Finally seems like fall here with the arrival of some intermittent rain this past week and the dial back of the setting sun, a little earlier each day.

Berkley Tie Dye

With regret, it was time to pull up the tomato and pepper plants on Sunday. Good news: put up seven pints of green tomato-chile salsa on Monday. Ate fried green tomatoes one night and last night a salad of thinly sliced a green tomato, thinly sliced not-quite-ripe pear and some greens made a nice salad.  This year I bought tomato and pepper plants due to our trip and found some that I had never heard of: Berkley Tie Dye, funny shaped fruits that ripen to reddish green outside and inside; Porkchop, a large yellow beefsteak with green streaking at the shoulder and Nebraska Wedding, another beefsteak type that was yellow, with a blush of orange. All tasty so I saved seed from each for next year. Now only a few ripe and ripening ones in a bowl on the counter (sigh). It will be six months or more until we taste a decent tomato.

A ripened Berkley Tie Dye tomato, streaked with green.

UPDATE: After the initial post, I found a ripe Berkley Tie Dye in a bowl with some cherry tomatoes and an Aunt Ruby’s green, so had to share.

Time spent this weekend will be planting garlic and fava beans if the weather cooperates.

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CANTOBER! IT’S FINALLY OVER…

06 Sunday Nov 2011

Posted by backyardnotes in Canning & Preserving, Harvest, Tomatoes, Vegetable garden

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bread baking, canning, peaches, pears, peppers, tomatoes

RETURNING FROM OUR TETON trip, these were waiting for me, all 26 pounds of them! Not to mention 10 pounds of pears, peppers, eggplants, and more.

AND THE TWENTY POUNDS OF AUTUMN LADY peaches that I bought from Red Sky Orchards just west of Ellensburg on our way home. What was I thinking? They were big, ripe and sweet. I couldn’t resist after the last box that never fully ripened.

SO, I got to work. The bulk of tomatoes went into a roasting pan along with onions, basil and homegrown garlic and then into a slow oven until the onions were soft. A brief straining to separate the juice/broth from the solids and then through the food mill. Yield: 4 quarts of sauce and 3 ice cube trays of tomato broth for later use.

With the tomatoes cooking in the oven I chopped up a colorful mix of tomatoes for Tomato Basil Jam (My Little Corner of Rhode Island) that was mentioned in a Food in Jars post. Yield: 6 half-pints

ON THE LAST DAYS OF AUGUST I used some peaches to infuse wine vinegar and make some peach liqueur. Time now to decant, strain and bottle.

After adding sugar syrup to the infused vodka I have a quart that needs time to sit a few more months before transferring to smaller bottles for sharing.

I wrestled with tossing all of the fruit that had soaked in the vinegar and the vodka–but I couldn’t do it. I made peach chutney. I added some onions, hot peppers, garlic, sugar, vinegar and spices. Yield: 8 half-pints

Autumn Lady Peaches: 5 pints of Peach BBQ Sauce from the Williams-Sonoma book of preserving recipes borrowed from my neighbor. About 5 pounds made their way in to a batch of  Peach & Rosemary Preserves. Yield: 6 half-pints

Two Peach Galettes from Rose Levy Beranbaum’s site; one for us and one for the neighbors.

PEARS: 4 pounds of the pears became Pear Vanilla Thyme Preserves with ginger and lemon. Yield: 4 half-pints

I caught a break the following week and we took a 3 day trip to Walla Walla with some friends to celebrate a birthday–so no canning! Had to make a stop on the way home in Bingen, WA at Dickey’s Farms where I picked up some big, beautiful Honeycrisp and Buckeye Gala apples. Soooo good! I indulged my yen for Tarte Tatin with some of the honeycrisp apples.

Nearly every night during October we ate a tomato salad of some kind. Yum! We’ll be sorry when they’re gone.

MORE TOMATOES: Mid-month as more tomatoes became ripe I picked another 16 pounds and combined a lot of them with 3 pounds of peppers for 10 pints of Tomato -Chile Salsa.

I picked all of the remaining tomatoes a week ago Thursday since the weather was cooling and we were headed for New Orleans on Saturday. All of the cherry tomatoes became 8 pints of pickled green tomatoes the day before we left. All of the other tomatoes are either green or in varying stages of ripeness and will have to ripen inside. We will savor every last one–maybe up until Thanksgiving if we’re lucky. It will be many months before we buy a tomato. Total tomato harvest must be close to 80 pounds.

I got on a bit of a baking jag. I had to refresh the sourdough starter (since it had a vacation while we did) and I picked the last of the zucchini and baked off six loaves of zucchini bread and into the freezer.

PEPPERS: All of the peppers were picked and the plants pulled to make room for the garlic. The remaining anchos, Anaheims, jalapenos, serranos became 3 quarts of chile verde sauce (into the freezer); the ‘sweet’ ones and a few hot peppers became 11 pints of pickled peppers.

Who doesn’t love cranberries? Two weeks ago my sister (fabricgirl) came up from Long Beach to celebrate our mom’s 81st birthday and she brought me two, gallon bags of fresh cranberries. I popped them into the freezer to keep until we returned from New Orleans (thank goodness for pre-planned trips). Hmmmm….cranberry wine jelly may be in order. And that should be the last of this year’s preserving. I think I put something in jars at least twice a week, every week of the month. At least that’s how if felt by the last Friday of the October. So as you can see, there was scant time for posting. Whew!

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THE TOMATO STATUS REPORT

16 Friday Sep 2011

Posted by backyardnotes in Canning & Preserving, Harvest, Jellies & Preserves, Peppers, Tomatoes, Vegetable garden

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banana peppers, brussels sprouts, canning, canning rack, delicata squash, Italian plums, Japanese eggplant, mangoes, mustard greens, pears, pink icicle tomatoes, red plastic mulch, tomatoes

AS YOU SEE, THERE ARE PLENTY OF TOMATOES. Mostly green yet. I’m not convinced that the red plastic mulch is a big improvement to aid ripening. Seems normal to me, even taking our meager summer weather into consideration. I think Ill skip the red plastic next year. We have had our share or ripe ones to eat, so not a big complaint.

Yellow flame tomatotes

Always a few crazily shaped ones.

Pink Icicle. I may save seed from this one.

THE REST OF THE VEGETABLE GARDEN is humming along.

Delicata Squash

Anaheim peppers

Japanese eggplant

Banana peppers

I planted a section of mixed mustard greens to use up old seeds: Osaka Purple, Gold & Ruby Streaks, Mizuna, and Ho Mi Z. Makes for a zesty salad mix when young and it looks pretty too.

Brussels sprouts are forming nicely and should be ready for Thanksgiving dinner!

THIS WEEK’S CANNING REPORT

Gingered Pear Preserves with a splash of cognac made on Wednesday are the first of the pear larder. They are a mix of Bartletts and Rescue. A little over four pounds yielded seven half-pints.

Daughter #2 has an Italian Plum tree and we picked about 4.4 pounds on Tuesday.

I kept out one pound for eating, split and pitted the remaining plums, and slipped them into freezer bags for later use. Straight out of the freezer and onto cake batter for plum cake. An easy and tasty winter treat.

Today another two pounds of pears teamed up two large mangoes for Pear-Mango Preserves. This one is my own combination. A little sweet and a little tart from the lime juice.

Pear-Mango Preserves Yield about 6-7 half-pints

2 large mangoes cubed to make 3-4 cups

2 lbs. pears, cubed (about 4 cups)

1/2 cup fresh lime juice

3 c./ 1.5 lbs sugar

8 oz. apple or pear cider (regular, sparkling or hard)

One 4″ cinnamon stick

about 8 basil leaves bundled and tied.

Combine pears, mangoes, lime juice, cider and half the sugar in a large saucepan. Bring to boil, add cinnamon stick and basil. Reduce heat to medium and cook 15 minutes. Add remaining sugar and cook over med-low until thickened. Turn off heat and let stand one hour.

Sterilize jars and heat lids. Check thickness of preserves. If too thick add a bit more cider or water; remove cinnamon stick and basil and reheat. Fill jars and process 10 minutes full rolling boil. Remove canner lid and let jars stand 5 minutes before removing.

ONE LAST thing. I hate the canning rack that comes with the big enameled canners. They are awkward to handle with jars. There are many jars that don’t fit the racks. I have a 12″ diameter cooling rack that fits perfectly and any size or shape jar sits flat without tipping. Additionally, if I flip the rack upside down, I can squeak the quart jars into the canner. I saw this post on Northwest Edible Life and thought it a quite ingenious solution.

Today at Outdoor Emporium I saw a really sweet aluminum stock pot with a nice rack; it would easily accommodate quart jars and was $32.00. It was very  much like this one. It is tempting as my old enamel canner is starting to rust after 35+ years.

Enough canning and harvesting for a while, I hear Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons calling…

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