The school garden had a fabulous semester. Not only did our wall of sunflowers work out beautifully, but so did our bean fort. Pumpkin patch?
Not so much. But we’re moving on to bigger things and brighter days as we move our garden’s location come spring. However due to harvest times, some of our produce–like onions and carrots–will be left behind. They need more time to mature. But not our tomatoes–look at these beauties!
No freeze, no frost, it’s been a warm December here in Florida (thank goodness!). A definite relief, as last year we lost our entire crop to an early freeze. 🙁 Not a happy day. Kids took it pretty hard. Lost everything.
But what if your tomatoes are not ripening on the vine and a frost is headed your way? Simple–you bring them indoors! Yep. Just pluck them from the vine and haul the load indoors and set near a sunny window (a patio will do!) and allow to ripen fully. So long as there is a hint of red on your fruit, you should be good to go.
I “learned this by doing” last year after Mother Nature surprised me with a hard freeze first of December. While tomatoes don’t like the cold, they can be covered during a night’s frost. However, if you’re in for a hard freeze for more than several hours, your tomatoes are toast. Or may as well be. It’s not a pretty site.
And I have sauce to make! In fact, tried my hand at it last week but apparently it tasted more like salsa than sauce–according to my Italian husband, anyway. Personally, I thought it tasted “fresh and light” and utterly delightful. I know you’re thinking: like salsa! But keep it to yourself, will you? I thrive on positive reinforcement and salsa jokes simply don’t work for me. How about instead going with something like: “Almost, honey! Just a little thicker next time, so it sticks to the pasta.” And smile. I do like smiles.
See? I’m easy! As to cooking the perfect sauce with your fresh tomatoes? More on that in a future post. Now the kids and are off to enjoy the season–
Merry Christmas!
What a great idea to work with and teach children in a school garden!
I would like to pass along a tip from the Midwest. You can also harvest your tomatoes when they are green and place them in a (closed) paper bag to ripen. It’s a little trick we must pull out of our hat in Michigan occasionally when we experience and earlier than expected freeze. I have a post about it on my blog if you can grab a bit of time to stop by.
Happy New Year! Debra
THANK YOU! (Love your blog!!!) Will try it today, in fact. We’re expecting a freeze this week… 🙁