[masraum]

Originally Posted by Superman

I am preparing out tomato area as we speak. It's only maybe 100 SF. If needed, we will get Yakima tomatoes by the flat, which are still pretty good. About as good as the tomatoes we grow.

We mostly put tomatoes up in quart jars, but we also make marinara, salsa, etc., and put those in jars as well. It is rewarding. They say two things cannot be bought, and one of them is a garden tomato. Heirloom garden tomatoes are as different from grocery store tomatoes as turbine engines are different from an earthworms.

We process and then freeze the basil in freezer bags.

We also pickle many things. Beets, beans, carrots, etc.

We do have a small pressure canner for when we need/want to can something that requires pressure.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with "water bath" canning, it is quite easy. The hard part is getting the jars very clean and preparing/inserting the fruit or vegetable. Tomatoes, or anything pickled, contains too much acid for any critters to survive. You basically cap the jar and submerge it in boiling water for a while. Keeps on the shelf for years.

But of course, the greatest tomato joy of the year is eating them fresh. I make tomato sandwiches with three ingredients including mayonnaise. Sliced tomatoes, basil and mozzarella drizzled with olive oil......mmmmmmm.

Sounds like a caprese salad sandwich. I love tomato sauce. I'm good with pretty much any cooked tomato. I've never much cared for a raw tomato. I remember finding that I liked "grape" tomatos. But they've got to be grape, I don't even like cherry tomatoes. I keep hoping that someday I find a "regular" tomato that I like.

I've heard/read, that over the years, tomatoes have been bred to be pretty, red, uniform in size and shape, and all around, visually pleasing. In the process, no one considered flavor, so that was mostly lost. Now that we've got some land, my wife is wanting to start a garden, and I suspect we'll grow tomatoes. If so, I'll be reaching out to starless since his seem to be widely loved.