Search Results for: label/tomatoes/page/7/2011/04/making-it

436 results

Which fruits and vegetables should I buy organic?

Mrs. Homegrown
Food
11 Comments
r as #34 on the EWG̵7;s ranked list of 53 fruits and veggies, #1 being the most pesticide-laden (apples) and #53 being the least (onions). So tomatoes are sort of middling contaminated. I should note the EWG wants to make it clear that you should not necessarily flee screaming from the Dirty Dozen. This is about awareness, and choices. From their FAQ:    Should I stop eating celery or blueberries or other produce items on your Dirty Dozen l...

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Harvesting and Drying Calendula

Mrs. Homegrown
Body Care, Calendula series, Gardening, Herbal Medicine, Herbs, How-to
32 Comments
Mrs. Homegrown here: Okay, so in a previous post I talked about growing Calendula. This post I̵7;m going to talk about harvesting and drying it. The next post I̵7;ll do on the topic will be about making a skin-healing salve from the dried petals, olive oil and beeswax. When to harvest:  Start harvesting your Calendula as soon as the first flush of flowers is in full bloom. Don̵7;t try to “save” the flowers. The more you...

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Vegetable Gardening With Dogs

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Tomatoes, Vegetable Gardening
9 Comments
We love all dogs and live with an elderly Doberman Pincher. But gardening with dogs can definitely have its challenges, especially when your trusted companion has a taste for heirloom tomatoes. On the right, the aftermath of one of our dog̵7;s nightly tomato raids, this time targeting our healthiest and most productive vine, a variety called Giant Syrian. The dog has managed to claim all but a few of the tomatoes off this vine, knocking off...

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Of Gnomes and Peak Oil

Mr. Homegrown
Thoughtstylings
RLeave a comment
What it looks like when I̵7;m “reflecting” on concepts like peak oil. Being momentarily or, perhaps, permanently carless has given me the opportunity to reflect on the long term future of oil. As coincidence would have it I stumbled on CNN commentator David Frum̵7;s delusional editorial, “Peak Oil Doomsayers Proved Wrong,” at the same time as I discovered Renaissance physician, alchemist and philosopher Paracelsus...

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Tomato Report: Blush

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Tomatoes, Vegetable Gardening
RLeave a comment
I think I̵7;ve tasted my new favorite tomato variety: Blush. I got to tuck into a box of these delicious tomatoes at the farm of Shu and Debbie Takikawa near Los Olivos. Yellow with red streaks, Blush tomatoes have the perfect balance of sweetness and acidity. The blush tomato was developed by geneticist and tomato geek Fred Hempel and are available via Seeds of Change. Due to a series of gardening blunders that I̵7;ll blog about at s...

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Matt’s Wild Cherry Tomato

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Tomatoes
12 Comments
...rn beefsteak varieties. Matt̵7;s Wild Cherry was obtained in Hidalgo, Mexico by Teresa Arellanos de Mena, a friend of  agronomy professors, Dr. Laura Merrick and Dr. Matt Liebman. Johnny̵7;s and other sources describe it as a small current sized tomato that readily reseeds. Johnny̵7;s Select Seeds carries it, and I̵7;m considering giving it a try to supplement the tomatoes that reseed themselves in our garden. Let us know in the c...

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SIP Improvement

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Self Watering Containers
13 Comments
mous tip on a BoingBoing tomato post: With tomatoes, you need to lay down a layer of high-quality landscape cloth (don̵7;t use the cheap stuff) to keep the tomato̵7;s roots from getting into the water chamber. You run it from the bottom of the bucket all the way up to the top of the soil line. If those roots get to the water chamber, your tomatoes will end up tasteless and watery. As long as you lay down the cloth and keep the SWC full, u...

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Countdown

Mrs. Homegrown
Events
24 Comments
Our new book comes out just about a month–April 26th–and today two super-advance copies came to us by mail. Believe me, it̵7;s awfully strange to see something that has existed only as computer files suddenly materialize on your porch! We realize we haven̵7;t given our new book a formal introduction yet, so here goes.  Making It: Radical Home-Ec for a Post Consumer World is our follow up to The Urban Homestead . The...

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Mandrake!

Mr. Homegrown
Fermentation, Food
2 Comments
grown Revolution suffered through the first film based on these kid̵7;s books on a transatlantic flight a few years ago, finally falling asleep during an endless video game inspired broom chase scene). Apparently wherever it appears in the world, mandrake (Atropa mandragora) has always inspired unusual beliefs. Buhner says, Though all indigenous cultures know that plants can speak with humankind, mandrake is almost the only plant from indige...

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Interview With Apartment Gardener Helen Kim

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Herbs
1 Comment
We got a lot of emails after posting the image above of Los Angeles based photographer Helen Kim̵7;s astonishing windowsill garden. It̵7;s a great example of what you can do with a small amount of space, and brings to mind William Morris̵7; advice, “Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful”. Helen graciously sat down for an email interview to talk about her beautiful and useful garden...

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