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“Home grown tomatoes, home grown tomatoes Tomatoes are a must for any vegetable garden. They are versatile, delicious,
colorful, and a pleasure to share with friends and neighbors. Best of
all, biting into your very own fresh-picked tomatoes creates immediate
taste bud ecstasy. Tomatoes are easy to grow, both in your garden and
in containers. And if you’re only familiar with Romas, Beefsteak,
and your typical round reds, you’ll be delighted to know that there
are around 4,000 different kinds of tomatoes out there! Have you ever
sampled a Cherokee Purple, a White Wonder, a Yellow Pear tomato, or a
Green Zebra? Keep scrolling down for the entire guide to growing tomatoes. If you're searching for organic fertilizers, organic pest control products, or great gardening tools, we recommend Clean Air Gardening. |
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"A world without tomatoes is like a string quartet without violins.”— Laurie Colwin, Home Cooking Tomatoes have been domestically grown in many parts of the world for
several hundred years, but probably originated in the New World. Several
wild varieties of what seem to be the original tomato still grow in the
western part of South America between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific
Ocean. They grow from northern Chile to Peru and Ecuador. Beware the Deadly Tomato?“You like potato and I like potahto, you like tomato and I like tomahto. Let's call the whole thing off.” — Ira Gershwin Although tomatoes were eaten in Southern Europe, Northern Europeans and
North Americans were often afraid of them, as tomato leaves are very similar
to those of the poisonous Belladonna, a member of the Nightshade family.
Call it guilt by association. Eventually Northern European and North American
taste buds warmed up to tomatoes and they became very popular. They are
now the most widely grown "vegetable" in the world. Tomato: Fruit or Vegetable?“Do not be afraid to go out on a limb ... That's where the fruit is.” — Anonymous Fruits are botanically defined as the reproductive part of a plant that forms from the fertilization of an ovum. Fruits generally contain seeds inside some kind of covering, although some fruits like strawberries grow their seeds on the outside. If you want to get technical, though, tomatoes are really “berries,” and strawberries are actually “brambles!” Confused? Check out this site about fruits and vegetables. The term “vegetable” is more of a popular term than a botanical one. Vegetables don’t contain seeds and include non-productive parts of plants including roots, stalks, leaves, etc. Given the botanical definition mentioned above, tomatoes are a fruit, although they are more popularly considered a vegetable. In fact, in 1893 the Supreme Court of the United Stated curiously decreed the tomato a vegetable, although recognizing that botanically speaking it is a fruit. This unusual declaration was based on the existence of an 1883 tariff that charged ten percent on imported vegetables, including tomatoes. A frustrated tomato importer decided to challenge the tariff, arguing that tomatoes were actually a fruit and thus should be excluded from the vegetable tariff. The Supreme Court agreed that tomatoes were botanically a fruit, but argued that they were commonly grown in kitchen gardens with vegetables and treated as vegetables in markets and American households. In other words, the United States Government wanted its tariff money—the heck with botany! Growing Tomatoes: Getting Started“Yup, gardening and laughing are two of the best things in life you can do to promote good health and a sense of well being." - David Hobson, The Mad Gardener If you’re thinking about planting tomatoes for the first time, it’s important to know that they are divided into two different types depending on how they grow: determinates and indeterminates. Determinates grow from vines that reach a certain point and stop growing. They are typically small and compact plants. Determinates usually give fruit earlier in the growing season that indeterminates. Indeterminates have vines that continue to grow. Indeterminates often need added support to grow well. Determinates will work well in containers and in a small garden space. Indeterminates are best grown in cages or on a trellis. Tomatoes are a tender, warm-season, long-maturing crop, so they must be started indoors in most parts of the country. Because starter plants are so easy to come by in nurseries, your best bet is to go ahead and buy starters to plant directly in your garden. Starter plants appear with certain codes that will help you determine their resistance to common diseases. • N for resistance to Nematodes Make sure you buy a plant that has nice green leaves without any yellow speckling. These starters may already have problems with disease. If you purchase starter plants from the nursery, make sure to choose healthy plants that haven’t been in their containers too long. Ideal plants for transplanting are 5 to 7 weeks old with roots that just about fill a four-inch container. Look at the bottom of the container. If roots are gowning out of the drain holes of a four-inch container, the plant has been in the container too long and will probably be severely stressed when transplanted. In addition, avoid buying starter tomatoes that already have fruits. These plants will generally produce fewer tomatoes during the year and may not grow fully. Growing Tomatoes from Seed “A good gardener always plants 3 seeds - one for the bugs, one for the weather and one for himself.” - Leo Aikman If you want to grow tomatoes from seed, sow your seeds indoors six to eight weeks before the last frost. Tomato seeds are very sensitive and planting them directly into your garden probably won’t yield results. The ideal temperature for germinating tomato seeds is 85o F. It will take five to seven weeks before the seedlings are ready to plant outside. Depending on your gardening zone, March is usually a good month to get your seedlings underway. You can start your plants in flats or large pots, and after they get their true leaves, you can transplant them into individual paper cups or plant bands. Growing your seedlings in paper cups or plant bands simplifies transplanting. By slitting the paper cup down one side or by removing the band the roots are left intact and undisturbed. Use a good potting soil of one-third garden soil, one-third sand, and one-third compost. Keep the soil nice and moist and place the flats in the sunniest window you have. When the weather becomes reasonably warm set the plants outdoors in the sun during the day and bring them inside at night. This will help to make the plants hardy. The
Vegetable Gardener’s Bible by Edward C. Smith has excellent
instructions on growing tomatoes from seed. His instructions also explain
how to transplant the tomato seedlings several times to develop deep roots.
Soil Basics for Growing Tomatoes“.... if I wanted to have a happy garden, I must ally myself with my soil; study and help it to the utmost, untiringly. .... Always, the soil must come first.” - Marion Cran, If I Were Beginning Again Soils are divided into various categories, such as clay, sand, silt, and loam. However, there are actually an infinite number of soil varieties as soils can vary widely in organic matter, large and small rocks, minerals, pH, and other factors. Most gardeners consider soil that has a combination of sand, silt, clay, and organic matter to be good soil. Healthy, fertile soil is also filled with bacteria, fungi, earthworms, and other beneficial soil organisms. In a natural environment such as a forest, leaves, branches and other organic materials are composted (broken down) by some of these soil organisms. The final result of this composting is humus, which is abundant in humic acids. Humic acids are complex organic molecules that help roots to absorb minerals and other nutrients more efficiently. All that organic matter on the forest floor also provides the necessary fertilizer the plants need to grow healthy and strong. In good quality soil, some soil organisms work to create humic acids
while other organisms help the soil in other ways. For example, rhizobium
bacteria attaches itself to roots of nitrogen fixing plants. The rhizobium
bacteria then makes nitrogen more available to the roots of the host plants
and other plants in the area. Here's a great tip. Get an electronic soil tester to make sure that your soil is right! Humus, the Great Equalizer“Apprentice yourself to nature. Not a day will pass without her opening a new and wondrous world of experience to learn from and enjoy.” - Richard W. Langer As the end result of composting organic material, humus is the ultimate addition to your soil. It has a pH of around 7, which is considered neutral, and has the ability to make minerals more available to your tomatoes and the other plants in your garden. Unless your soil is very acid or very alkaline, humus will provide all the neutralizing and fertilizing you need. Humus should also be added each fall to keep the soil healthy. Humus has another major benefit as it adds structure to soil. If your soil is too sandy, humus will help it hold water. If your soil has high levels of clay and has poor drainage, humus will loosen up the soil and improve drainage. Like most plants for your vegetable garden, tomatoes will do best in soil with good drainage. With the addition of hummus, your tomatoes will truly thrive. Composting for Terrific Tomatoes“If a healthy soil is full of death, it is also full of life: worms, fungi, microorganisms of all kinds ... Given only the health of the soil, nothing that dies is dead for very long.” - Wendell Berry, The Unsettling of America, 1977 Composting at home is one of the best ways to simulate the naturally occurring hummus found in nature. If you haven’t already begun composting garden materials and kitchen wastes at home, you should think about starting as soon as possible. Even if your tomato garden is well under way, you can start composting immediately to improve the soil for the next growing season. Composting is an easy and ecologically friendly way to get rid of green waste. Basically, home composting involves collecting kitchen scraps and garden waste and allowing the material to decompose in order to get a rich, dark, earthy material to add to your soil. For effective composting, you should first invest in a good compost bin if you don't already have one, and a compost pail to collect kitchen scraps. These two items also make a great garden gift for other tomato gardeners. Good quality compost bins and pails will increase the quality of your compost and make the process easier. Things such as grass clippings, leaves, egg shells, coffee grounds, and fruit and vegetable peels make for excellent raw material for your compost pile. Meats, dairy products, and animal bones are not recommended. For complete instructions on composting, see the Guide to Composting. In the case that you don’t have a supply of compost ready for your tomatoes, you can easily purchase compost from your local nursery. However, be aware that some commercially available organic composts haven’t completed the composting process and contain very little humic acid. If you suspect that the compost you purchased is of questionable quality, you can amend it by adding liquid humic acid or compost tea. Both of these products are available online. Soil pH for Tomato Gardening“There ought to be gardens for all months in the year, in which, severally, things of beauty may be then in season.” - Sir Francis Bacon pH is a measure of acid-base balance and uses a scale of 1 to 14. 1
is extremely acid; 7 is neutral; and 14 is extremely basic (alkaline).
Since pH is a logarithmic scale, 6 is 10 times more acidic than 7 and
5 is 100 times more acidic than 7. It follows that 8 is 10 times more
alkaline than 7 and 9 is 100 times more alkaline than 7. For example, Paprika requires a soil pH of 7.0 to 8.5 (neutral to very alkaline). Fennel, however, grows best in soil with a pH of around 5.0 to 6.0 (acidic). If you plant an acid-loving plant in alkaline soil or vice versa, the plant may grow, but will be weaker and more susceptible to pests and disease. Tomato gardening in soil with the proper pH will insure healthy plants with a strong immune system that can fend off all kinds of predators. A pH of 6.5 is the point where nitrogen, phosphorous, potassium (N-P-K) and trace minerals are most available to majority of plants. Tomatoes will grow with a pH range of 5.8 to 7, and although they are adapted to slightly acidic soil, they will grow best near the 6.5 pH mark. You should check the pH of your soil before you add any soil amendments. Inexpensive soil pH test kits are available from most garden centers and on the Internet. You can also buy this terrific, inexpensive Soil pH Tester online.
Working the Soil for Healthier Tomatoes“Nature is not a place to visit, it is home.” - Gary Snyder If you check your soil pH and find it extremely acidic or extremely alkaline, you may have to add amendments to bring it closer to neutral. If your soil is very acid, you can add lime to neutralize the pH. If your soil is very alkaline, you can add agricultural sulfur to neutralize the pH. In either case, your aim should be to add enough amendment to change the soil to a pH of 6.5 to 7. In either case, the addition of organic compost will help the soil. If your pH is anywhere near neutral, the only amendment that you need is the humus. You’ll also need to get an idea of the soil texture to see if your soil needs working to improve drainage. A good way to test the texture of your soil is with the “Ribbon Test.” After you take a soil sample, roll it back and forth in your hand. If it sticks together easily, it is high in clay, if it simply falls apart, it is probably has a lot of sand. Clay soils don’t drain well and are difficult for the roots to penetrate. Sandy soils drain well but don’t retain nutrients. Adding organic compost will help improve both sandy and clay soils. You can also try digging out a good quantity of the soil, around 16 inches deep, and placing a layer of fine gravel at the bottom. The best overall way to determine if your soil is ready to plant is with
a basic soil tester.This Electronic
Soil Tester tests both pH and fertility of the soil. Other testers
are available that measure light levels, moisture, etc. Mulching is also a great way to keep you tomato plants growing strong. Mulch helps to keep weeds from growing and facilitates moisture retention in the soil. Mulching also begins the process of natural composting. After you add a layer of mulch around your tomatoes, soil organisms will begin to decompose the mulch that is closest to the ground. Earthworms and other critters that live in the soil pull composted material into the ground and naturally feed your plants’ roots. You should add a little more mulch each year to your tomatoes to keep
the process going. You can use mulch even when your soil is in excellent
shape. The mulch will keep the soil healthy and productive. You can further
support your soil by adding a dose of organic
fertilizer. Your mulch will work best when you add this natural fertilizer
over the entire garden bed so that the whole area will gradually become
healthier. Planting Tomatoes “Gardening requires lots of water - most of it in the form of perspiration.” - Lou Erickson As soon as all danger of frost is past, you can set the tomato plants permanently in the garden. It is usually a safe time to plant tomatoes when the native trees in your area are in full leaf. Tomatoes like warm weather and should have eight or more hours of sun a day. The average nighttime air temperature should be 55 degrees F or more and the soil temperature should be at least 55 degrees F to 60 degrees F. If you expect lower temperatures, be sure and cover your tomato plants. You may need to gradually acclimate your plants by exposing them a little at a time to sunnier conditions before planting them. While still in their containers, place them in a shady spot. You can then move them slowly out of the shade over a period of two or three days. After a few days of increased exposure to the sun, they will be ready to place in the garden. When transplanting tomatoes into your garden, be sure to pick a sunny location, and add a generous amount of compost or well-decomposed manure to the soil. You’ll want to plant your tomatoes deeply. For instance, if the stem of your tomato is six inches long, place it three inches into the ground. Wherever the stem comes in contact with the ground, roots are initiated and the vigor of the plant increases. As a guide, place the plants in the soil up to the first true leaves. Give your plants a good long drink after you transplant them. Spacing of the plants really depends on the variety of tomatoes you’ve selected and their growth habits. Space indeterminates tomatoes around 1 ½ to 2 feet apart in rows. Remember to stake your plants for best results. If you grow indeterminates in cages, give them a bit more room, up to 3 feet is recommended. If you want your tomatoes to spread out liberally, up to four feet apart is best. Determinates can be spaced around 1 ½ to 2 feet apart. Your rows should be spaced out about 4 feet apart. You should also think about whether you want to intercrop other plants in your garden. For example, you may want to plant a few carrots distributed throughout your garden. Give your tomatoes additional space accordingly. Other than occasionally training and retying your indeterminate tomatoes to the stakes, you can sit back and watch your tomatoes grow. Cultivate around the plants to keep weeds out, and during hot, dry weather water thoroughly at least once a week. Make sure to water your tomatoes consistently, as inconsistent watering leads to severe stress. After a couple growing seasons, it’s a good idea to rotate your crops. Even in a raised bed, it is best not to plant the same kinds of plants in the same spot each year. Vary the kinds of plants in your garden over the years, move them to other locations and try different combinations. This will insure that your soil remains healthy. Also, avoid planting your tomatoes where you are currently growing or have at one time grown potatoes. The Late Blight, Phytophthora infestans is a disease that affects potatoes and tomatoes and can linger in the soil even after you’ve removed the potato plants.
As gardeners are always trying out different techniques and learning new tricks, it is important to learn as much as you can from a variety of sources. We’ve listed a few helpful links below: Vegetable
Gardener’s Bible Growing Tomatoes in Raised Beds or Containers “A garden always gives back more than it receives.” - Mara Beamish Raised beds can be a great option for growing tomatoes. They have the advantage of being adaptable to different heights to create interesting visual effects in your garden or to reduce back strain. You can also add a large amount of soil or customize soil depth to grow other plants that require shallow or deep rooting depth. Additionally, you can quickly and easily change out plants and soil. Raised beds are also an excellent way to provide improved drainage for your tomato plants by customizing your soil mixes. If you plan on growing a variety of herbs, fruits and vegetables with your tomatoes, raised beds can help you achieve a proper soil mixture for each kind of plant. For example, you can have a bed or container for acid loving Fennel, a bed for alkaline loving Paprika, and a bed for tomatoes and other plants that prefer more neutral soil. Traditional rectangular raised beds built with boards or cement blocks work great, but you can be creative. You can use any design you want for your raised beds. Keep in mind that raised beds can add a great aesthetic touch to your landscaping. Raised beds don’t necessarily require rows, but you should still think about proper spacing for your plants. In addition, keep in mind access to the plants at harvesting time. You want to design your raised beds to make harvesting easier, not more difficult. This raised bed gardening guide has lots of useful tips. If your space is limited, tomatoes grow very well in containers. Remember that your soil should always have plenty of humus and that your containers should be big enough if you wish to intercrop or add companion plants. (See below for more info on intercropping and companion plants.) Clean Air Gardening offers an unusual Upside Down Tomato Planter which is a great way to grow tomatoes if you’ve got limited space. For more information on container gardening, click on Pot Veggies or the Container Gardening Tips site. This organic liquid vegetable fertilizer works great with tomatoes and other edibles that you might grow. Grow Tomato Plants Indoors in the Fall“When the bold branches If you’d like to keep eating your own home-grown tomatoes through the winter, just pot up one or more small stocky tomato plants in the fall, and then bring them indoors to grow and bear all winter and spring. You can get a good source of stocky tomato plants in your own garden. Obtain the plants by cutting a branch off a bearing tomato plant and place it in a container of water. In about a week, small roots will appear. Another option is to cover a branch that’s still attached to the plant with soil over a 3-inch section, and leave it in the ground for 10 days or so. After roots sprout, the branch can be cut from the larger plant and potted in a mixture of half compost and half light garden soil. We leave our potted tomatoes out in the garden for a few days, and then bring them inside on a warm day. Tomatoes make very attractive house plants. We keep ours in a south window with various flowering plants. They usually start blossoming in November and continue to bloom and bear tomatoes during the winter and spring. They should, of course, be located in a well ventilated spot.
Fall blossoming and bearing tomatoes are heavy feeders. Bone meal mixed in near the surface of the soil during February and March can help your tomatoes stay healthy through the winter. For healthier plants, water tomatoes with rain water, compost water, or water that has stood at room temperature for several hours. Before they become too big to move, we also put them in the sink and shower them once a week. You can even put them outdoors during unseasonably warm winter rains for a source of naturally soft water. Alternative Tomato Growing Methods “The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance, the wise grows it under his feet.” - James Oppenheim If you’re looking for a unique way to plant your tomatoes, you can try out the “Japanese Tomato Ring.” The Japanese Tomato Ring is an unusual growing technique that one gardener claims can produce as many as 600 tomatoes per plant every year. The Japanese Tomato Ring was supposedly developed by a postman in Charleston, South Carolina in the 1960s. The technique is based on the postman’s own design and curiously has nothing to do with Japan. Read the history of the Japanese Tomato Ring here. The method involves forming a large ring with fencing wire and filling it with a fertile mixture of topsoil, compost, and mulch. The tomatoes are actually planted around the outside of the ring and send their roots into the nutrient rich soil and compost mixture, which has plenty of air pockets for the roots to breath. Watering is performed not by irrigating the plants, but by pouring water over the top of the ring and letting the water and nutrients slowly water and fertilize the plants. As the tomatoes grow, you can tie them onto the wire and train them to grow up and over the ring. This Florida horticultural extension site explains how this method works and even has a diagram. Another alternative planting method is to dig a trench a few inches deep and long enough to lay the whole tomato plant sideways, except for the top four inches. Cut off the stems below the top four inches. Lay the tomato plant sideways in the trench and bury everything except for the top four inches. Companion Planting and Intercropping “What this country needs is dirtier fingernails and cleaner minds.” - Will Rogers As with most fruits and vegetables, planting a monoculture of tomatoes closely packed together in your garden typically will attract more pests and disease. The best way to plant tomatoes is to intersperse them with other kinds of plants. This is called intercropping. As an example, tomatoes and carrots make excellent vegetables to intercrop. By planting carrots between tomato plants, both will benefit and there will be fewer pests. Another organic gardening technique is known as companion planting. This is a method that involves growing certain plants together that strengthens one or all of the plants. A great example of companion planting long known to Native Americans is the “Three Sisters” combination of corns, beans, and squash. The beans serve as nitrogen-fixers for the other plants, the beans climb the stalks of corn, and the squash shades the ground to hold in moisture. Check out this great website on the “Three Sisters”. Another example of companion planting is roses and garlic. The scent of garlic will repel some of the rose’s worst enemies such as aphids. Roses Love Garlic, a book by Louise Riotte, is a classic gardening book that explains many beneficial plant relationships. Nasturtiums and marigolds planted in close proximity to your tomatoes and carrots will also makes your tomatoes more resistant to pests. White flies and aphids do not like nasturtiums. Nematodes and whiteflies do not like marigolds. However, tomatoes, carrots, nasturtiums, and marigolds are the best of friends. Besides ending up with a nice balance of healthy plants, you will also get beautiful flowers to enhance your landscaping. If you plant your tomatoes in containers, you can still use companion planting by simply planting your nasturtiums and marigolds in separate containers that are close to your tomato plants. For more information on companion planting, see Companion Plants, Companion Planting, and Patch Companion Planting. Unusual Tomato Varieties For the more adventuresome tomato grower, here is a short list of some of the more unusual tomatoes that you can grow. Try something weird this season. It's fun! Amish Paste. This indeterminate is an heirloom that’s great for making sauces. The fruits are a strong red and the flavor mildly acidic. Black from Tula. A determinate Russian heirloom with an unusual dark color and wonderful flavor. Fruits arrive during the summer and into the fall. Brandywine Heirlooms. (Indeterminates)
Cherokee Purple. This beautiful indeterminate bears tomatoes that vary in color from pinkish to purple. The tomatoes are large and the plant holds up to mild drought conditions and disease. Green Zebra. One of our favorites with a light citrus flavor. This indeterminate grows green with light-green stripes. It’s not a big tomato, but it will definitely make an impression in a mixed salad. The plants will give you lots of tomatoes over the growing season so be prepared to share with friends. Red Pear. A determinate. This is a rare heirloom which will provide you will small pear-shaped tomatoes with a beautiful rich red color. Yellow Pear. A delicious tomato that has a golden yellow skin and fruit. Will grow rather tall so it’s best to plant with a stake or with a cage. White Queen. This is an indeterminate heirloom that resembles the beefsteak tomato and is one of the whitest tomato varieties you can find. These tomatoes are lightly sweet and very juicy. Oregon State and Tomato Fest are two great sites for complete lists of tomato varieties and details on how to grow them. Tomatoes are an important part of Italian cooking, and make for a a delicious meal when you grow your own. Tomato Recipes “Tomatoes and oregano make it Italian; wine and tarragon make
it French. Sour cream makes it Russian; lemon and cinnamon make it Greek.
Soy sauce makes it Chinese; garlic makes it good.” You can boil them, can them, mash them, sauce them, dice them up and spice them up in salsa, slice them for salad or just sink your teeth into them! There are so many ways to prepare tomatoes, it’s mind-boggling! We’ve done some research on interesting tomato recipes and we’re fortunate to include here a few unique recipes offered by the Texas A&M Aggie Horticulture webpage. You can also find tomato recipes and much more on this page. BIG BATCH SPAGHETTI SAUCE 1/4 Cup olive oil Heat oil in large pan. Saute onions and garlic until tender. Add rest of ingredients. Heat to boiling. Reduce heat. Simmer, partially covered, for 2 hours. Stir occasionally. After it has simmered, cool completely and store in freezer bags or containers in increments that you find best for your family. When ready to use, thaw and heat. Favorite ingredients can be added like sliced mushrooms, cooked/drained sausage, hamburger, etc. This sauce is great for any Italian dish. We use it as a sauce for several types of pasta and as a pizza sauce. Fresh tomatoes may be substituted for large cans. You will still need
to include the tomato paste. Peel, core, and chop enough tomatoes to make
approximately 12 cups. The rest of the recipe remains the same. JALAPEÑO SAUCE Submitted by Ms. Beverly Tippett of Timpson: Peel and cut up tomatoes. To peel tomatoes drop into boiling water, leave for 1 1/2 or 2 minutes, put into ice water. Chop other ingredients in food processor or by hand. Combine all ingredients and bring to boil. Simmer for 1 1/2-2 hours. Pour into jars, then seal. TOMATO SOUP 14 quarts ripe tomatoes, 7 medium-sized onions, 1 stalk celery, 14 sprigs
parsley, 3 bay leaves, 14 tablespoons flour, 14 tablespoons butter, 3
tablespoons salt, 8 tablespoons sugar, 2 teaspoons pepper PICCALILLI Most piccalillis are made with cucumbers, but East Texans cleverly adapted
this recipe to meet their own needs. This is a sweeter relish than some.
Combine the vegetables and salt; cover with water, and soak overnight.
Drain and rinse the vegetables. CURRIED TOMATOES Put in the frying pan a heaping tablespoon of butter and half an onion minced; cook two or three minutes; then stir in a scant teaspoon of curry powder; cut the tomatoes in slices and fry brown in the seasoned butter; sprinkle with salt, and serve at once on a hot platter. CHILI SAUCE Submitted by Ms. Gladys Freudenberg,1441 Robin Lane, Seguin, Texas Mix all together and cook (simmer) until the desired thickness is reached (25-30 minutes). * adjust to taste. GREEN TOMATO JAM Take 4 lbs. of green tomatoes, 4 lbs. of loaf sugar, 1 cup water, and 2 ounces of preserved ginger. Wash tomatoes and cut in pieces; add remaining ingredients and cook until clear, which will require about two hours. Strain through a coarse strainer to remove the seeds. Pour boiling hot into sterilized jars, and seal. GREEN TOMATO SOUP Take 4 green tomatoes just beginning to ripen, one large onion; slice all together; cover with salted water, and cook until done. Add one cup of milk and two cups of sweet cream. Serve at once with crackers, croutons, or bread sticks. |
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