tomato taste test: ‘juliet’ plum, farm-market find

A cherry plum, sweet, thin-skinned and very prolific (you’ll also find it sold under ‘Red Grape Sugar Plum’). It was in the top three of our recent taste test and everyone liked it for its strong tomato flavour that’s sweet but not overly so, and its firm not mushy texture. It has a slight acidity running through it which all sweet tomatoes need. It ripens quite late compared to ‘Sungold’ and produces for a long period of time. It’s lovely in a mixed salad with the larger varieties. 

When it comes to garden gear, there is a clear divide among growers: Those who love tomato cages, and those who consider them an absolute useless eyesore. I’m controversially the latter. Aesthetics aside, there are a lot of questions I have about the invention of this particular metal torture device, and I have opinions about how it might not be the best way to grow your tomatoes. In fact, there are a lot of things that can go wrong with your crops due to cage structure—increased pests and lower fruit production to start! 

Growing Tomatoes from Tomato Slices is the easiest way to have your own specimens. The best part is, you can do it from store brought tomatoes and then relish fresh harvest right at your home!

The key to getting the most productive tomato plants is to plant the right companions with them. Read this article to find out which are the best Tomato Companion Plants!

Summertime is upon us, and here in South Carolina, that means garden-fresh tomatoes, sweet corn, and watermelon until our bellies ache. However, if we haven’t planned a vegetable garden like THIS, where can we find all of this delicious produce? During the summer season, farmers markets can be found sprouting up throughout the state, where shoppers can buy in-season, nutritious produce while supporting local farmers. To help make the most out of your next farmers market trip, explore the following tips:

Blossom end rot, which (just as it sounds) is a rotting of the fruit that begins as a watery spot on the blossom end, also affects peppers and eggplants. It’s a physiologic disorder—not something caused by a virus or fungus or bacteria, like so many other tomato ailments, but rather by physical stressors that prevent the fruit from taking up enough Calcium to come to ripeness in prime condition.The watery spot transitions to a dry, sunken lesion (it looks as good as it sounds, above, served up on a non-silver spoon).Why the deficiency of Calcium, though? What did I do wrong? Various factors can bring it about, including soil that suddenly goes dry (as in a fierce heatwave), excessive fluctuations in soil moisture, over-application of high-Nitrogen fertilizers (not guilty!), roo

WHAT DO YOU SAY (AFTER ‘THANK YOU’) when someone sends you something thoughtful but, well, um, you’re just not an orange person? This latest doodle from Andre Jordan reminds me of all those holiday gifts I never wore but just couldn’t throw out, either.

THE ANNUAL RITUAL BEGINS: At tax time in the Northeast, we start our tomato seeds indoors, though many of you may be putting your seedlings out in the garden already or otherwise way ahead of me.

I got to know Franca this year when she opened an actual shop for Boxwood Linen in the next town, Hillsdale, New York, at the historic Hillsdale General Store, which was recently renovated. Franca grew up on a farm in Ontario, the daughter of parents born in Scanno, Abruzzo, so she is no stranger to the ways of the garden and kitchen.“We had a cellar, a cantina, at the old farm in Canada,” Franca recalls, “where we’d store not just canned goods but cheese and prosciutto and sausage—but no more!”Now Aida, Franca’s mother (above), visits her daughter’s Hudson Valley, New York-based home from Toronto each late-summer-into-fall, when the garden is offering up its best and there’s work to be done. Together, Franca and Aida continue the old traditions, but in a new location. They do hot-packed tomatoes two ways: chunky, and also as a puree. Aida used to use a motorized mach

A little about Michael:“That’s Michael Dodge,” I say, when I show people around the fall garden, as we pass a large group of show-offy, yellow-fruited Viburnum I enjoy all fall into winter. V. dilatatum ‘Michael Dodge’ is truly a standout plant.But the original Michael Dodge, the one that great shrub was named to honor, is a well-

Kate Spring, and her husband, Edge Fuentes, founded Good Heart Farmstead in Vermont in 2013, which serves up to 100 customers each season who subscribe to their CSA share program. Their farm is a hybrid business structure called an L3C, a low-profit, limited-liability company, where part of the mission is to support Vermonters in need of food access.Kate’s also a writer and the only person I know with her very own brand new yurt, which I couldn’t wait to hear about after having seen it be constructed on her Instagram.Read along as you listen to the December 14, 2020 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on Apple Podcasts (iTunes) or Spotify or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).mastering microgree

Yes, you could simply separate seeds from the pulp and skip the smelly-gooey-gross part of the process. But that part–the natural act of fermentation that’s happening in the jars in the photo below–helps break down germination-inhibiting compounds such as the gel sac around tomato seeds, and can also reduce some seed-specific diseases.let’s save some tomato seeds:Select a few of your best-looking mature fruits from each of your healthiest-looking plants. The variety must be