Now that I have a greenhouse, October no longer means the close of my garden and forage season. I plan to harvest tomatoes and other ingredients for my foodie cooking experiments all winter long! I’d read that an easy way to start tomato seedlings is to place a seed-filled slice in garden starter mix, so I thought I’d give that a try.
As an experiment, I bought one tomato from my local Wegmans grocery store, and one from a vendor at my local farmers market. I chose the organic Beefsteak variety. One of the reasons I like Wegmans is that they support sustainable sourcing, buying regionally and locally as much as possible. Still, you can’t get much more farm-to-fork than a vendor at the farmers market, right?
I planted a thick, seed-packed slice of each tomato into my growing mix on September 8. Want to guess which tomato slice produced more seedlings by mid-October?
I know I was surprised…
Yup, the grocery store tomato. The farmers market tomato only produced one viable seedling—which really surprised me. It makes me kind of wonder about that particular vendor and his produce…
I also have the Black Brandywine heirloom variety in the greenhouse that’s quite tall but not yet producing, but a hearty slice of Beefsteak tomato in the middle of January sounded too good to resist. I’ll keep you posted on progress!
In other news, I had a wonderful book signing at Twigs in Purcellville last week! Thank you, Amy Turner, for the opportunity to sit on the front porch of your lovely shop on a gorgeous Saturday and talk to people about gardening, foraging, and The Forager Chefs Club! If you don’t have your copy yet, The Forager Chefs Club is available online at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Bookshop.org, as well as at brick-and-mortar locations in Virginia like Twigs, Fields of Athenry Farm Shop & Sidesaddle Bistro in Middleburg, and Birchtree Bookstore in Leesburg.
Thank you for all your encouragement and well wishes!
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