Here it is the middle of October, weeks after a hard freeze, and I'm still drying tomatoes. The tomato crop was large again this year, with a good crop from about 16 tomato plants. Since I have so many tomatoes ripe at the same time, I have to find a way to store them for use later, and having already so many jars of canned tomatoes, I now dry them.
We use a lot of dried tomatoes - they are great on salads, thrown into stews, or just eaten right out of the bag. Since I don't use any preservatives, I freeze them once I dry them, just to be sure they don't go bad from any residual moisture left in them.
This year we grew Better boys, Amish Paste, Sun Golds, Jet Sonic, Sweet 100's, and two varieties from Bulgaria.
The Bulgarian Tomatoes were from seeds brought back by a relative. They germinated well and grew vigorously. The fruit from these were huge, one being a pinkish red and the other a true tomato red. Both were gorgeous tomatoes, but we thought they were rather bland compared to the Better Boys. I probably won't grow them again, although I may save some seeds.
The Sungolds and Sweet 100s are cherry tomatoes that taste great, produce well and dry fantastic. These are on my "always grow" list, along with Better Boys and Amish Paste.
The Jet Sonic tomatoes were great producers of perfect looking fruit, but I found them rather bland. I won't be growing them again.
4 comments:
Yum! I haven't tried drying tomatoes but I roasted and froze lots this summer. Isn't it great to have that summer flavor in the dead of winter?
Ohhhh I'm soo jealous right now, I've been dreaming of starting a real garden someday and I'm a sucker for fresh tomatoes!
I love the last photo, I guess it is a very beautiful shot!
I wish that my tomatoes had turned out this great. I'll be posting a photo of my, finally, first one on my blog in a day or so.
Well, the chicken pecked off the first one that was on the plant when purchased; and all summer none grew on the other plants 'till now. Go figure.
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