Everyone loves tomatoes! Hues from scarlet red to milky white, sunburst orange, lemon, green, purple, candy stripes; they are all heirloom tomatoes. A favorite anecdote for me is about a plant that has been around for at least 50 years (officially called an heirloom). In my garden, I mix hybrid and heirloom.
A hybrid is the product of an arranged marriage of sorts. I love my hybrids; I have many lovely, juicy hybrids that never let me down. For instance, I grow Early Girl, Sungold, Bush Big Boy Hybrid, Sweet Tangerine Hybrid, San Marzano and Roma VF. However, there are a plethora of choices to be made just as fun as mine! Of course, it’s not just fresh tomatoes we crave. Cooked tomatoes are the foundation of the best-selling condiments in the world: salsa and ketchup. They can be simmered slowly into sauce, turned into tomato top pizza, enchiladas, and meatloaf. Steamed and pureed, blended with milk, they become cream of tomato soup: great comfort! Check out cookbooks especially about tomatoes: you’ll never regret it!
Robin Raab, Plot #18 (Photo by Michael Davis)