Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Tomatoes!

  Tomatoes in the hundreds.

Arriving back to Dubbo this January was an exciting time and collecting many hundreds of tomatoes was a welcome delight.
 These overripe red cherry's (var. 'Tommy Toe') were destined for a relish or ketchup of some sort.

I am so happy to be able to pick some fresh produce now I am back.
Then we arrived at Jess and Geoff's place where they have kindly invited us to stay while we are waiting to move into a place down the road. They have taken great care of our vegies and herb pots we left at their place over Christmas, extending their irrigation systems to provide water to them, especially our thirsty tomato vines. The following assortment of delightfully colourful Heirloom tomatoes is the result!

 Geoff and Jess have a little aclove that is protected on three sides and faces south so the heat isnt too severe in summer where they have tree ferns and herbs and tomatoes. The big ones you see are from the corners of the little aclove and taste amazing - there is a big dark reddish purple tomato that had hints of all sorts of flavours if you let your imagination go wild.......shiraz depth...and overall an earthy, meaty tomato great for our lunch sangas.
 The bright orange heirloom tomatoes were creamy in texture, much like a persimmon, but not sweet.. more savoury with a tang - perfect for a relish where other sweet things are added.
 Geoff, Daniel and Jess with the goodies.


 I picked over them for my favourites (wild sweeties) then throughout the week we made Bolognese, Burgers, Relish and Ketchup.
 A little truss of lemon drops (var. 'Yellow Beams Pear').
Little gems (var. 'wild sweetie').