The Last Tomato
October 28th, 2014
Groundhog invasion notwithstanding, the saddest downer of the gardening season is the last tomato.
George’s last tomato of 2014, about ready to be picked.
I picked my final one of 2014 over the weekend.
It was a wimpy vestige of August’s sweet, meaty, red heirlooms – soft, a washed-out red in color, and showing a few spots that make ripening doubtful.
I’ll eat it anyway because I know it’ll be 8 long months – at least – until the next jackpot pays out.
I can’t imagine a summer without fresh tomatoes from the backyard garden. At the moment, I can’t imagine going 8 months before slicing a ‘Big Beef’ or a ‘Brandywine’ on a plate with some mayonnaise.
Of all of the edible crops, the tomato is the one that makes our gardening effort more worth it than any.
If evil aliens came along and demanded that I give them every plant in my yard except for one, my tomato plant would be my solo keeper.
Even though supermarket varieties are better than they used to be (packaged grape ones aren’t half bad), they’re still a far cry from superior varieties ripened fully in the mid-summer sun.
This year I had the privilege of growing some of the finest tomatoes I’ve ever eaten.
They came from saved seed sent to me by Bill Mende, a tomato-loving reader who said these were the best he’d ever tasted.
The variety was a large, heart-shaped, pinkish-red heirloom whose heritage is cloudy, other than that it apparently originated in Yugoslavia. Bill called it ‘Yugo.’
I found an heirloom called ‘Crnkovic Yugo’ online, but the shape doesn’t quite look the same. Neither does a variety called ‘Pik’s Yugo.’ So I’m not sure exactly what variety it might “officially” be in case you’re thinking about tracking it down.
The good thing about heirlooms is that you can save seed and usually have it turn out very, very close to true. I took care of that by saving seed from a superb, fully ripe ‘Yugo’ specimen in August. So I’m set for next year’s seed-starting time around the beginning of March.
This year turned out to be a reasonably good tomato year. Like a lot of people, I battle septoria leaf spot and early blight diseases each year. Despite a laundry list of cultural precautions and multiple copper sprays, my plants are typically on the way out by early September.
This year most of them hung in there until the end of September. A few plants were still chugging along until this week.
The problem with fall and tomatoes is that the cooling temperatures and dwindling sunlight slow ripening to a crawl. The plants just can’t get the warmth and energy they need to finish off a maturing fruit as during the magic of August.
Once frost hits, it’s all over for this South American native. We’ve had some brushes with frost already, and some areas actually had a light one, so I should add here that you really should get any tender plants you don’t want to lose inside ASAP.
Most tomatophiles study the forecast intently this time of year, waiting as late as possible to gather anything showing a tad of pink to wrap in newspaper, which some believe helps them ripen (the fruits, not the gardener).
Some gardeners also pick the green fruits, using them to make fried green tomatoes (tasty), relish (good) and even green tomato pie (never had it).
That milks every last succulent ounce of flavor out of a year’s crop, but barring a greenhouse and potent lights, tomato season ultimately goes kaput.
Then we wait.
And eat grape tomatoes from the store.
If you’re looking for a few good tomatoes, I wrote a Patriot-News/Pennlive garden column this past February in which I asked local “tomatamorati’s” (tomato fans) to name their favorites.
And to taste a few dozen superb varieties, the Franklin County Master Gardeners each August stage a tomato-tasting day (among other tomato events) in Chambersburg that’s open to the public. It’s free. Check out the Franklin MGs excellent blog and type “tomato day” in the search box for more on that event and past winning tomato varieties.