From Seed to Harvest - A tale of this year's tomatoes

Hello friends,

Back in early September 2022, I had a hope as I do every year, that the tomato seedlings I was sowing into seed raising mix would grow strong and healthy, and would provide us with food over the summer, and then into autumn and winter as well.

Every year when the Kings Seeds catalogue arrives, I open it with glee, pouring through the pages, and circling all the many seeds I wish to purchase. My particular favorites are tomatoes, and I love to grow a wide variety for both eating fresh, and in cooking.

 The tomatoes I chose to sow for the 2022/2023 growing season were:

• Tomato Juane Flamme (Orange, very tasty)
  

• Tomato Andy's Red F1

• Tomato Grosse Lisse (Beefsteak)
  

• Tomato Pomodoro (Cherry)
  

• Tomato Thessalonki (Beefsteak)
  

• Tomato Andiamo F1(Italian Cooking variety)
  

• Tomato Cocktail True Red F1 (Cocktail)

With all the many tomato seeds sown in domed seedling trays they were safely placed in the dining room in the sun, and close to the warmth of our woodburner.

In very early October, the seedlings that had come up were transferred into bigger, single pots, and transferred out into my glasshouse so they could continue growing.

We installed my glasshouse when we moved back home to Dunedin in 2019. It's an Allen Christie Regal Glasshouse, it's 2.4 m wide by 3.6 m long, and is zinc-alum coated with automatic vent openers. It really isn't possible to grow plants like tomatoes, cucumbers, basil, capsicums and chilli peppers in Dunedin without a glasshouse, so while we were house hunting we made sure our new home would have space for a glasshouse.

At the end of the first week of October, Dunedin got a snow warning. I wasn't overly optimistic that it would snow, but I didn't have a choice but to transfer all my seedlings that were in the glasshouse, into our spare bedroom for safety. If it did snow, the snow part wasn't what I was worried about, it was the frosts that would follow the snow that would kill all my seedlings off...

Well, it started snowing the next morning. And the snow stuck around all day, with numerous snow showers off and on between sunny spells. I was very grateful for having brought all my precious tomato seedlings inside...

 

 And when we woke up the next morning, we had 8 cm of snow on the ground.

It was like a winter wonderland, except, it was the middle of spring, and we never usually get snow this late at this time of the year. But at least my tomato seedlings were safe and warm, all tucked up in our spare bedroom.

The snow slowly melted that day, and after a couple of frosts, normal spring weather returned to Dunedin.

My tomato plants were transferred into their final positions in the glasshouse, along with cucumber, basil, and capsicum and chilli plants.

It didn't take too much time before my tomato plants reached for the sky thanks to the warmth of the glasshouse, and by the first week of December, the first flowers had appeared.

Tomatoes began forming, and ripening, and on Boxing Day, our first ripened tomato (a Juane Flamme) was harvested.

As per my usual tradition, the first tomato is always eaten on some fresh, hot toast, with just a sprinkling of salt on top. It was delicious.

We're now into peak tomato harvesting season, and while some tomatoes are eaten fresh, most are frozen away to be used later. Later on in the season, some of the frozen tomatoes will be made into Tomato, Capsicum and Lime soup, and also turned into tomato sauce. I'll share both recipes with you when it is time to make them.

There really is so much to do in the vegetable garden at this time of the year, I really should get into the garden and harvest some more now...

Have a wonderful day,

Julie-Ann