Oh how we love tomatoes here at the Farm! We grow as many as we can fit into the greenhouse, and sometimes outside too! You read last week about my Aunties greenhouse and the 37 tomato plants that I brought home from her house (see that post here). I also planted a few varieties of my own as well, but this week we will talk about the ones we loved and maybe the ones that didn't work so well!
This is the cheery cherry variety "Cherry Punch". It grows quarter sized tomatoes like giant grapes on vines and the flavor is amazing!
Strings and strings of them! Very few of them make it out of the greenhouse (I have a "one for the bucket, one for me rule")!
Here is a partially ripe string of "Cherry Punch". They go all the way up the plant that way and they are on an indeterminate plant so it gets quite tall! The finished tomato is a deep red like cherry Koolaid. The "Cherry Punch" grow sort of on top of the string - rather than below it. The plants are strong and I don''t usually need to support the tomato stems at all. This is the second year we have grown this variety from Auntie and it is a keeper. We will grow this again.
Above variety is the "Sun Gold" cherry tomato, I have previewed them before on here (read about it here) and this is a huge favorite of all of ours. I have grown this variety for about 5 years now and they seem to do well indoors or out. They end up being a golden orange color when ripe, they grow like grapes on the vines, almost the same size as grapes, and the only drawback is that they will split if you let them hang too long. This is a keeper as well and will be grown forever as far as I'm concerned!
This is the "Parks Whopper" started at Snowfire Gardens and it is a great tomato. The flavor is very good, and it is a beautiful color ad gets good sized - probably 8 ounces. It is more of a bush tomato - doesn't get too tall and spindly. Texture is great for the BLT sandwich and for a slicer or salad dice. Only one drawback is that it doesnt produce very many tomatoes. We got maybe 6 off of this plant all summer. I would probably grow this one again if it was given to me. Flavor is key here.
Above is a shot of "San Marzano" a paste or sauce tomato. Yum-o! I would grow this again every year as well. It produces a plethora of lovely pear shaped tomatoes all up and down the bushy plant. The texture is a little bit pithy for an every day eating tomato but for sauce it is bomb. This one came from Aunties as well. We actually grew two sauce tomatoes from her - "Bella Rosa" and this one. "Bella Rosa" is a good one as well and it works for an every day eater as well as sauce. It doesn't produce as prolifically as "San Marzano" but its uses are a little broader. I didn't get a picture of that one - sorry!
We also grew "Better Bush" which is a good hanging basket tomato and is a keeper - good flavor and a decent slicer with good texture.
Early Girl is also a favorite here - it lives up to its name - comes on early in the season and produces right through fall. Good slicer, with great texture and flavor.
I started Cherokee Purple and Black Krim - both are old varieties and we like them a lot. I will grow them again even though they arent very prolific producers, the color, flavor and texture more than make up for the lack of production, and I think if I had got them started earlier (I didn't get mie planted until end of April) we would have got more 'maters! Great slicers both as well.
Those are all of the ones that are really notable from the varieties that we grew this summer. We had a big huge greenhouse full andit was wonderful. Really fun to see all the varieties and try the new ones. I encourage you to try as many as you can!
Tub of bright beauties of all varieties!
Fresh Roasted Pasta Sauce
3-4 pounds of ripe tomatoes diced into about 1" cubes- any variety ( I like to mix them up)
10 cloves of garlic - sliced or quartered
1 large onion sliced thin and halved (I like white for this)
1/2 C Olive oil - light preferable
Mix all together in a bowl and spread onto a baking sheet with an edge, or a 9x13 glass dish. Sprinkle with sea salt (we like smoked) and fresh ground pepper. Sprinkle with a little (1/2 tsp) red pepper flake and a little (1/2 tsp) cayenne pepper or Chipotle if you like a little heat (which we do).
Bake at 400 in the middle of the oven for 40-45 minutes.
Once out of the oven, let cool for a few minutes and then sprinkle with some fresh Basil leaves chopped finely. Put the whole lot in a bowl and mix well. Some folks like to puree with a hand blender, but I prefer to mash mine with a wire whisk or a spud masher. It is awesome as a chunky pasta sauce and it cans and freezes well too if you have enough tomatoes you can easily double or triple the recipe.
We serve over spaghetti noodles with chunks of roasted chicken or some Italian Sausage.
Enjoy!
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