First tomato on the vine

Is an Oregon Spring

A busy canning weekend

5 cans of green beans, 4 pints of chutney, and two more cans of sauce! It was a very productive weekend canning and I am the proud new owner of a pressure canner!








The chutney is extra special dear to my heart - Mom's recipe but made with fresh tomatoes for the first time! It is a little lighter in color because many of the tomatoes were beautiful yellow ones.

Step one of Making Tomato sauce

Step 1. Clean your sauce tomatoes and remove greens and stems. Gently core tops.

Step 2. Place prepared tomatoes in a stock pot such as a dutch oven or this Le Creuset and bring to a boil.

Step 3. Turn down heat and simmer until tomatoes fall apart. You can also use a potato masher to assist. You will have a wonderful start as pictured below.

The next step it to run it through the food mill twice. The first time on the largest sieve to strain the skins. The second time use the smallest sieve to catch the seeds!

Then you reserve the tomato pulp and use it to make sauce, according to the recipe you choose.

Hurricane Irene Tomato Sauce

In preparation for the unknown, I harvested all ready and ripening tomatoes before Hurricane Irene arrived. These two pints happily joined the blueberry jam on the top shelf of the freezer in the basement.

I am happy I made these wee 2 pints  because we didn't have power for four days. I am also happy I didn't do any more drastic harvesting before Irene's arrival because our garden weathered the storm just fine! One week after Irene, my green tomatoes have ripened and I foresee much more sauce in jars this weekend!

Pickled Tomatoes

Thanks to the Ball Blue book, I found something to do with all my sungold and sweet 100 tomatoes!!!! There were four jars, but Heather took one home last night!

Tomato Harvest

Got up and out of the house early this morning so we could beat the heat and tend to the tomato jungle. When we were done we carried a whole hod-full up to the house to be sorted. Below are all the ripe ones, freshly washed and draining in my very bright sink.


In our work, many green tomatoes fell off the vine. They are now ripening by the back porch.

I'm wondering - are the semi ripe tomatoes in the bag enough of a catalyst to hasten ripening, or should I go get a ripe banana to add to the bag?

Backyard Beauties from Backyard Farms!

Why has it taken me so long to realize that those beautiful vine ripened tomatoes at the market are locally grown!? Backyard Farms grows those wonderful tomatoes year round in the largest greenhouse in New England. They even have native bumblebees inside the greenhouse to pollinate each tomato flower. Bees are struggling these years so it is a win win situation for the bees who then receive their food from the tomatoes’ pollen. I wonder if they will make honey too? Their use of sustainable energy and rainwater reclamation round them out to be one of my favorite discoveries this summer. I do hope that they will not fall prey to the late blight, because I just might have to rely on these beauties for my upcoming tomato sauce project! And better yet, they have recipes on their website! Thank you Backyard Farms for all that you do!