Saving Late Green Tomatoes After A Frost

Submitted by David Trammel on Tue, 08/13/2019 - 09:30
David Trammel's picture
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The Third Circle: Gardening and Composting

I ran across this suggestion, on how to save green tomatoes after the first Fall frost.

"Some lucky gardeners might get summer crops, including tomatoes, up until the first fall frost. Jentz said if an early frost hits and you still have some life left in your tomato plants, pull the entire plant up and hang it upside down on a covered porch or in a sun room. Whatever green tomatoes are left on the vine will ripen just like that."

I have had some success with putting green tomatoes on a window ledge with some Sun and letting them ripen. This seems to be similar. Wonder if you would need to water the exposed roots?

ClareBroommaker's picture

ClareBroommaker

Sat, 10/05/2019 - 12:59

You can eat tomatoes green. They have a lot of vitamins C & A. Probably most people have heard of fried green tomatoes, a Southern US delicacy, but you can also cook them in soup, stews and casseroles. The first time I had this I was surprised that the green tomatoes were not bitter, because they often seem bitter to me when fried. There are green tomato soup recipes on the internet if you don't have an idea how to combine them with other ingredients.

You can also make green tomato pie, jam, diced green tomatoes with corn or hominy, green tomato pickles.

But yeah, if you've got a lot of green tomatoes, try a variety of uses and try to ripen some of them. Our very last (green) tomato harvest is usually around November 9 and our last indoor-ripened tomato is usually eaten just after the New Year holiday.

lp

Fri, 12/13/2019 - 15:10

This year I put my green tomatoes in a brown paper bag along with a ripe banana. They eventually did turn red, but very, very slowly (over the course of a few weeks).