True love and a home-grown tomato

Heirloom tomatoes
Originally uploaded by slambo_42

"There's nothin' finer in life than true love and a home-grown tomato." -- Gary Ibsen. The Great Tomato Book, 1999.

Does this guy know what he is talking about? I definitely agree with him.


Do you plant a variety of tomatoes each year? I always do, with cherry tomatoes, Early Girl, Big Boy, and then some new to me, like Stupice and Zebra.

In my area, where we don't get ideal huge amounts of heat and sun, I sometimes plant San Francisco Fog, varieties from Russia, and Stupice which is from Poland. Cherry tomatoes do well here.

Some lucky folks from hotter areas have already harvested their tomatoes. Mine are still green and the stuff of dreams.

Of course I also plant basil and oregano to perfect future tomato salads.

What varieties of tomatoes do you favor?

Pizza Garden

Pizza Garden July 2007
Originally uploaded by Sally J.

A fun project with children is creating a PIZZA GARDEN.
This involves finding a spot in your yard that ideally gets 8 hours of sun a day, or six hours minimum, and laying out a garden in the shape of a round pizza pie.


Using string to guide you, mark out pie shaped slices, dividing your pizza into 6 or eight slices.
Fill each slice with pizza ingredient plants: cherry tomatoes, Early Girl tomatoes, onions, garlic, basil and oregano, and anything else your family loves on their pizzas.
You can edge the pie with white stones, to look like crust, and add yellow flowers like marigolds to stand in for cheese.


When the tomatoes and other veggies are ready, cookup a tomato sauce on the stovetop, and create a pizza.
I often use Boboli crusts available in a lot of grocery stores, or you can use a frozen crust or make your own if you are talented in that arena.
I found this photo on Flickr.