My Michael Nolan

Like every Southern woman should, Aunt Ruby knew tomatoes.

The gardening wonder woman from Greeneville, Tennessee passed away in 1997 but not before leaving behind one of the best tomato legacies in the South.

The heirloom tomato bearing her name seems tailor made for my favorite Southern delicacy, with its beefsteak qualities and average size of about a pound each.

Of all the foods associated with Southern cooking, fried green tomatoes have to be at the top of the list – at least in my experience they have been. I can’t even remember the number of places Read the rest of this entry »

By Kira Hamman

Looking for a good book to pass the time until the tomatoes are ripe?

Try these:

100 Heirloom Tomatoes for the American Garden, by Carolyn Male
This book from Smith & Hawken is, according to Amazon, “for the true tomato snob.” Well, that would be me. Male gives excellent assessments of the relative strengths of the varieties she features, plus tons of information on culture and, of course, mouth-watering photos.

In Praise of Tomatoes, by Ronni Lundy
From tomato history to tomato pop culture and everything in between. Brush up on your tomato trivia!

Grow the Best Tomatoes, by John Page
The Storey guide to growing tomatoes. Storey’s guides are simple, straightforward, and reasonably complete. Plus, Read the rest of this entry »

By Michelle Fabio

Although many of you are just getting your tomato plants going, if you happen to be in Florida, you can pick your own tomatoes at Sandy Biggar’s 53-acre U-Pick Farms in Fort Myers.

For 99 cents a pound, the choice is yours.

“The tomatoes will be around for a while, but once the tourists leave, picking really slows down,” Biggar said. “Locals don’t pick many tomatoes.”

All the more reason for you to head over and have your pick of the litter, so to speak—Biggar says the tomatoes should continue to ripen well into Read the rest of this entry »

By Michael Nolan

In a minute I’m going to rant about fertilizing your tomato plants, but first I need to cover something that is a little more important.

This topic was supposed to be saved for another couple of weeks, but when I read the news today, I felt that I should go ahead and write it now.

A popular brand of fertilizer products has been recalled and you need to know about it as soon as possible.

The products are all made by the Scotts company, and the specific items that are recalled are: Read the rest of this entry »

By Thomas Cenci

I love making pasta dishes, there simple and easy to make (most of the time) and you can do so much with them.

You don’t have to stick to the same old spaghetti, linguine or penne either, why not try making ravioli’s?

It’s easier than you might think, and what better ingredients to use than tomato and ricotta cheese, so just follow the recipe below and enjoy.

Ingredients:

For the pasta
• 100g pasta flour
• 4 egg yolks Read the rest of this entry »

By Kira Hamman

If you’re anything like me, you started just a few too many tomato seeds.

They’re so little, really, and it always seems like an extra flat or two is no big deal.

I somehow manage to ignore the little voice reminding me that an extra flat or two when I sow the seeds translates to, oh, about an extra 300 square feet of garden space and at least that many extra pounds of actual tomatoes.

Then it gets to be the end of April and the plants (now in 4-inch pots) are covering every horizontal surface in my home. My kids have nowhere to do their projects. Or brush their teeth. Or sleep. My husband says it’s him or the tomatoes.

Happily, the same principle of three Rs that every self-respecting environmentalist has memorized applies here, too. Read the rest of this entry »