The Color of Impatience

[ladysprite]

I like the color green. It's pretty, it's bright, it's the color of life and growing things and warm weather and things-that-live-on-sunshine. It's the color of my cat's eyes, and my favorite skirt. Green is lily pads and the leaves of my geranium and the basil plant on my windowsill.

Unfortunately, green is also the color of the tomatoes in my garden. Eleven plants (and I still don't know why I planted that many, other than I had the space and the seedlings came in flats of twelve), all of them shoulder-high and laden down with nearly a dozen big, fat, happy, tauntingly green tomatoes that refuse to ripen under any circumstances. Every day I go out to the garden, and I pick the day's metric buttload of zucchini and green beans and cucumbers, and an eggplant or a bell pepper or two, and I stand and I stare at the tomato patch and I sigh.

I've tried coaxing. I've tried pep talks, and pleading, and I've even tried leaving them alone. I've put them in cages and tied their heaviest branches to supports so the poor little tomato-backsides aren't sitting in the dirt. I've tried feeding them, and not feeding them, and still they sit there and wallow in juvenility. I am the proud owner of nearly one hundred unripe tomatoes. And while I am more than happy with the rest of my produce, it galls me to no end to have to go to the market and buy pale, tasteless tomatoes to go in my salad while the plants in my yard sit there with smug looks where their faces would be if tomatoes had faces.

Sometime, most likely about a month from now, I will be desperately searching for ways to use up each day's bushel of the darn things. Right now, though, it's just not fair.

Comments

[gingicat]

Green tomatoes work pretty well in pickles, I'm told. My Bubbe used to make them, but I was six years old and very picky, so I only know that the grownups liked them.

[ladysprite.livejournal.com]

Um... aside from the fact that I can't stand the taste of green tomatoes (not fried, not pickled, not in pie, not any other way I've ever heard of - tried them all, can't make myself swallow. They trigger my gag reflex *badly*), picking them now means I don't get red tomatoes later.

If I leave them, they will become real, edible tomatoes. If I pick them now, they won't. I'm just impatient.

[rufinia.livejournal.com]

... She does not like them, Sam I am...

[keshwyn]

Amen, sister!

I've had ONE tomato this year. It was a little yellow cherry tomato, and ohhhhhh it tasted so good and sweet and flavorful in my mouth. It was the first real tomato I'd had in years that I can remember...

...none of the rest of them are ready. This is fundamentally cranky-making.

Tomato Faces...

[weasel2000.livejournal.com]

The tomatoes are mocking you...you should discipline them...
I have only three words for you :-D Fried. Green. Tomatoes.

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

I knew somebody was going to say "fried green tomatoes"! But y'know, I never would have believed that they were any good, until I had a chance to try some. They're not bad at all -- they still taste tomato-y, not harsh and sour like I thought they would. So if you're in the mood to try that, I say go for it; just slice, dip 'em in your favorite breading mix and fry 'em up.

I draw the line at drinking sour milk with them, though!

[ladysprite.livejournal.com]

In my experience, they taste bad. Not bad as in icky, bad as in unripe, inedible, undigestable, hindbrain-reflex-get-that-out-now-it's-poison bad. It's a personal quirk, I guess, but my body just rejects them like a bad transplant. You're welcome to my lifetime supply, though - at the end of season, I wind up giving a whole bunch away. I save that for after the time when they'll no longer ripen on the vine, though....

[pagawne.livejournal.com]

When you start getting too many tomatoes, if you would like, I can send you my grandmother's tomato catsup recipe.

[jtdiii.livejournal.com]

Alas you are not the only one...

I have over 20 tomato plants that are mocking me with various green tomatoes. There are green cherry, green plum, green beefsteak tomatos and a few varieties I do not know the name of, just hanging there on the vine.

Grumble...

Meanwhile the squash plants are trying to take over the yard, having already conquered the garden.

The peas and snow peas are ripe so not all is lost.

[siderea]

I'm guessing they need sunshine. We've been low on that this summer, and I know that's what plants need to make sugars (yay, photosynthesis), and sugars are what plants need to ripen fruit.

Maybe if you had a big lamp....

[hawkegirl.livejournal.com]

A couple things could be going on.

They might not be getting enough sun light.

They might be a slow ripening variety (did you check?)

They might of been planted to early (or late).

They might not be getting the right kind of plant food.

Mostly likely they'll start to turn before summer is over. However you can try and experiment with taking a few off the vine and either ripening them in a closed paper bag that has an apple in it, or in the window. They should turn red off the vine (I do the stick them in the window thing when I'm force ripening them, but I've heard others do fine with a paper bag trick).

BTW, as far as I know fried green tomatoes are made in the south with a type of tomatoe (much like the green zebra) that stays green. It's not the same thing as an unripe tomato, it's a ripe green tomato.

FWIW companion planting issues that planting garlic and basil around your tomatoes will excellerate ripening (obviously too late for that now, and my personal experience doesn't support that). However if you plant one variety that is a quick ripening variety (even if you're not so gung ho on that particular variety) it will push the others to ripen sooner.

Pink tomatoes

[cristovau.livejournal.com]

I'm concerned about our pink tomatoes. I'm afraid that they will go red, get over-ripe and fall while we are at Pennsic. Why did they have to schedule a war in the middle of early harvest?

Re: Pink tomatoes

[jtdiii.livejournal.com]

Because otherwise Pennsic would be cool and comfortable with crisp nights.

If we did that there would be more authenticity and less bare flesh. Horrors!

Re: Pink tomatoes

[cristovau.livejournal.com]

Shush your authenticity-minded mouth and bring on the chainmail bikini sunburns. Hey, if I connect the dots I can spell "bimbo" in Welsh.

Re: Pink tomatoes

[bess.livejournal.com]

At least they're beginning to turn pink, even with the deeply shaded yard.

Sigh... And someday we'll get zucchini... and why aren't the eggplants or peppers doing anything? At least the zukes are flowering. And we're getting small amounts of broccoli.

[matildalucet.livejournal.com]

I have exactly two tomatoes, neither of which is ripe. One is sort of mutant looking, like it's trying to turn itself inside out. The other is good looking, just now starting to turn yellowish, and will probably decide to ripen while I'm in Belgium. If it does, I hope Heather enjoys it. If it waits for my return, I'll take a nibble and pass it to Steve. I love growing tomato, but don't particularly like eating raw tomato.

My best guess is lack of sun. It appears my basil plants are shading my tomato plant. It might be pesto time when I get back.

[hfcougar.livejournal.com]

I will keep an eye on your tomato. Fortunately, I don't think marauding pigs care for them.

[dreda.livejournal.com]

Sometime, most likely about a month from now, I will be desperately searching for ways to use up each day's bushel of the darn things.

If you need a home for wayward ripe tomatoes later, let me know. I will be happy to adopt many, many of them and send them on to a good place.

[spectoria.livejournal.com]

Two years ago the Beloved Object and planted something called "Sweet 100" which we thought was somekind of lot number. Ha. Ha. Right. At the peek we were pulling 4 pounds of tiny red tomatoes a day.

I learned that you can make HUGE batches of homemade spaghetti sauce and freeze it. You can also blend them into small pieces and make tomato ice cubes (for later use).

However, the best idea didn't occur to any of us until the bump crop was over. Apparently you can donate excess veggies to most soup kitchens and homeless shelters.