Secret Farm: A garden blog

Amish Paste Tomato

Here is one of the first Amish Paste tomatoes. They are big and red and seem to be a great paster - though I have yet to make any paste - ever. I probably won't either. I'm not really a sauce maker, and certainly not a canner. I do like to cook with tomatoes though, which is why I grew these guys and the Black Plum Pastes as well. Having to cook everything so long using my slicers last year made me finally see the light. They taste pretty good uncooked too. I will grow these again.

Another plus is the plant is also really big and branching, or wait, is that a minus. Well anyway, The plant is giving me a really good crop. It's one of my most prolific producers.

Cocozelle Zucchini

This is the first and only zucchini I have picked so far this year. I am very disappointed! I know I planted pretty late, but I don't think that's the cause of my squashy woes. Most of my zucchini are turning yellow and shriveling when they get about two inches long. Their flowers aren't even open yet when it happens. Anyone else having this problem? The only thing I can blame it on so far is the weather. It was really hot and dry for weeks and now we are getting tons of rain and it's cooled way off. I watered every day though when it wasn't raining, and the plants look good.

Everyone always says they are swimming in zucchini by now, what gives? I sure hope to be bathing in it soon myself.

Mysterious Yellow

These guys are a complete surprise. I thought they were going to be Green Zebras like the rest of the volunteer tomatoes that I plopped in next to the garage, or maybe a Half Moon China as I had lots of them fall off and rot last year due to squirrel and mice damage, but no. They formed unifom smallish globes and I thought, oh they are Burbank Red Slicing Tomatoes. Oh well. (Not one of my faves from last year.) They started to ripen, and instead of red they were - yellow! With red streaks on the bottom even. Huh. Never grown these before. What gives? The only thing I can think of is cross pollination. Does anyone else have experience with that? How often does it happen? Any other suggestions for what happened?

Well, they're nice sunny little yellow guys anyway, and quite agreeable on the palate as well. Nice and juicy with your regular type tomato twang. A good sandwich or salad tomato. They are also hardy little suckers as they are sandwiched between two zebra plants, have been trampled quite a bit and barely watered.

Raised Garden August '07

Here's the raised garden as of yesterday (8.6.07) It's a little hard to see, but those are tomatoes on the right and along the back. Beans are in the center, carrots on the left. On the far left in back are 3 of the Romanesco plants - still no sign of a floret or whatever it's called on any of them. Someone told me they took forever, I guess they weren't kidding. Hidden in various spots are some beets, leeks, and scallions.There's some peppers on the right and left hand side, and finally, a bunch of dill sprinkled throughout.

I didn't pack it in as much as I usually do, but instead, this year I went for a more random disorganized approach. Some areas are packed in and others are nearly barren and constantly needing to be weeded. Oh well, one of these years I'll get it just perfect! Then We'll probably have a tornado or something. ; )

btw, that's our garage in the background, not our house!