You know, there's nothing like a garden fresh tomato. That veggie will have to also be number one on my list. My only regret is that there is a growing season for tomatoes. Wouldn't it be nice to have a 12 month regular harvest coming in of these delicious and versatile plants.

Of course, there is canning and freezing, but that's just not the same as garden fresh.

Oh, for a greenhouse!

I am in complete and total agreement. How I wish I could get garden fresh tomatoes all year!

What's your favorite tomato variety to grow, Bob?

My basic criteria for a tomato is that it slices to the size of a hamburger bun. The beefsteak variety is nice, but there are tastier varieties in smaller packages. Lots of variety to choose from.

My very favorite way to eat a tomato is thick sliced with a thin piece of fresh mozzarella (preferably homemade) and topped with a piece of freshly picked basil and then laced with a delicate olive oil. mmmmm

(Do we have a smily picture of a guy with his mouth watering?)

Trish, are those tomatoes from this years crop?

No, not from this year. When I wrote this article, we hadn't harvested tomatoes yet!

When do you usually get your first ripe tomatoes Trish?

Usually the first week or so in June. This year, we got our first harvest at the end of May.
With no rainy days, the tomatoes matured faster.

Wow, we won't have tomatoes until next month sometime, probably the end of the month. : (

Our tomatoes are already done for the season! 100 degree days put a quick end to our tomato growing fun. The good news is that by July 1st we had harvested many hundreds of pounds from our garden. But we've never had them quit so early.

We're looking forward to our fall crop, where I expect that we'll get the same yield again, hopefully more!

Hopefully!
Lynn- We sold at the farmer's market, ate all we possibly could, and I still canned 52 pints of salsa, 12 quarts of tomato sauce, and 3 quarts of chopped tomatoes before the plants quit for the summer! We had quite the bumper crop this year!

I miss them already...

Your making my mouth water.

I have real bad tomato envy going on here

I have tomato envy, watermelon envy and all that space to grow the lettuce and spinach. All I have are green onions!

Green onions are good too
Next year you can have a patio veggie garden. Oh, and you can write an article about it ;)
We've grown those little watermelons meant for contains before. They were pretty good! Dave would have to tell you what variety they were. Not heirlooms, that's for sure!

With my new bigger garden, we jumped into growing veggies for the first time. (my Mom always grew tomatoes that she shared with us) We got a bit of a late start as we needed to build raised beds (gopher central here!) but things really took off once the weather warmed. Hubby designed a couple of beautiful raised boxes with a trellis entry.
This is a whole new learning experience for both my husband and I but we love it!
We have:
6 tomatoes
beets
radishes
several different kinds of peppers
strawberries
lettuce
squash
swiss chard
dill
eggplant
1 watermelon
gold fall raspberries
rhubarb
artichoke
lemon cucumber
blueberry
We also have a dwarf nectarine and peach tree and a weeping Santa Rosa plum tree.

We know we want to try many more things next year, your list makes convinces me of that! I know we will have to add more containers. We are also adding a few grapes and more red raspberries and blueberries plus I want an upright thornless blackberry that I had been reading about.
Photo taken mid June, it's pretty full now! Plus we added 3 wine barrel planters down the center and in one back corner.
The tellis is planted with a rose and clematis on the right and a couple of cup n saucer (Cobaea scandens) vines on the left, one green, http://www.anniesannuals.com/p... one purple, http://www.anniesannuals.com/p... for quick fill in. I have to upload the newer shots of the trellis, hubby did copper piping between the posts.

bob said:(Do we have a smily picture of a guy with his mouth watering?)