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Viewing 1 - 2 out of 2 Blogs.
Since I began gardening seriously, 5 years ago, I have aspired to grow enough tomatoes to make a years supply of tomato sauce. The first couple of years I planted tomatoes en masse, figuring quantity would do the trick. Being able to handle 40+ Tomato plants be damned, I was going to have my sauce.
I finally learned to narrow down variety, grow the plant for the intended use, space them properly and take care of them!! What a novel idea. This year I planted three varieties, had amended my soil well over the last couple years with organic fertilizers, lime, compost, and cover crops.
I grew "San Marzano", a Roma, "Cherokee Purple" my favorite eating variety, and a "Brown Berry" a brown heirloom cherry tomato,
I have 16 San Marzano plants, three Brown berry, and three Cherokee .
I have had a stellar tomato season. After an early summer hail storm which damaged a few things and slowed a few other things down; the 'maters recovered nicely and flourished.
the following photos are of my sauce adventure.
my peak harvest yielded
about 25 pounds of Romas and about 18 pints of cherry tomatoes. I thought I would photo document the sauce
process for fun. Will someone please slap Chef boy'Ardee !!!
let's begin with a big harvest.
and then put on a pot of sauce and let it go....slowly....
gently......
Or, if you have ALOT of tomatoes, you might use two pots
I processed the tomatoes in a blender, skins seeds and all, its all good!!
did i mention low and slow....
Ready for the Jars..
and then to the water bath for a 35 minute process
and voila!!!!
the finished product:
ohh yeah..I almost forgot... here's another good idea when you have fresh tomatoes to slice and basil in the garden.
25 pounds of tomatoes equaled about 22 qts of pureed tomatoes, which i cooked down by half to make a thick sauce. The Yield was 11 3/4 qts. which with one more harvest should yield me about 22-24 qts. for the season.
Mangiare!!!
http://www.gardenstew.com/blog/e1292-21-the-spoils-of-the-garden.html
Tags: Compost Fresh Harmony Fun Success
Todd's Garden Asparagus initiative year 2Category: http://www.gardenstew.com/blog/c1292-1-garden--eco.html | Posted: Tue Mar 31, 2009 8:57 pm
the last day of March and I was weeding the garden, thinking thoughts of fresh salad this spring and tomato sauce in mid summer, when LOW and BEHOLD I saw a spear of asparagus sprouting up. then as I inspected the rest of the patch I saw ALOT of spears peeking up through the soil!!
there is a blog entry from last year here where I initiated my plan and put in a bed of asparagus crowns. they grew well and I resisted all temptations to eat any last year. after letting it grow up, die off and over wintering, I have been anxious and was quite surprised to see some of it peeking out already. I thought it was too early, we have had a very wet cool spring ( so far). I thought it would be a good idea to inter-plant clover between rows for weed suppression. not bad in theory, but i should have planted crimson clover instead of white clover. reason: white clover has spread and almost over taken some of the rows. crimson clover would have died in the freezes over winter leaving only green manure and fixing nitrogen to the soil. I spent quite a bit of time hoeing (sp?) out the white clover. lesson learned. I will mulch the beds in a few days to further assist in keeping weeds back.
on another note, I have planted onions, cauliflower, beets, radishes and carrots so far. Only the onions , lettuce beets and my cauliflower transplants are up . In a friends greenhouse I have tomatoes and peppers started.
Happy gardening- Spring hath sprung!!
http://www.gardenstew.com/blog/index1292.html
Tags: Gardening Harmony Soil Compost
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