The Tomato Plant That Ate New York

Tomatoes - Day 1

Tomatoes are an integral part of Italian cooking. It's hard to go a whole day without seeing tomatoes somewhere on the menu. A good tomato is just as important for a hearty pasta sauce as it is for a salad or bruschetta. Not all tomatoes are created equal, and one that's good in sauce may not be quite as good in caprese. A gardener that also likes to cook will want to have a few different types in her garden so she can use the optimal variety for her intended dish. It was with this philosophy in mind that we planned our tomatoes for this year's summer garden.

We've grown tomatoes most years for the past decade or so, but we tended to be more conservative in the number of tomato plants we chose. Typically, we'd only have one or two plants--enough to enjoy most days of the week, but not necessarily enough to make sauce or can. The area in which they are growing this year has proven to be fertile tomato-growing ground in years past. The first year, we grew a single tomato plant in this area and ended up with a plant that outgrew its tomato cage by about 10 feet. No, really. We didn't feed it extra plant food, we didn't do anything special. We just put it in the ground, watered it regularly, and let nature do her thing. The plant's unbelievable growth spurt defied any growing guides we could find for any variety of tomato. They just aren't supposed to get that big. People we told about the tomato would give us the "are you sure?" look, assuming we were pulling their leg and engaging in a loose association with the truth. I assure you, we were not.

Tomatoes - Day 115

One or two years later, we planted there again. And again, we grew another Tomato Plant That Ate New York. This one might have been a little bit bigger than the first one. Again, no special plant food, just put it in the ground, watered it, and let it be. My parents blamed my green thumb; my dad claimed that because I had touched it, it was imbued with some magical plant energy that made it erupt into a monster-sized plant. I think tomatoes just like it there. There's good, rich soil, plenty of sunlight, and it's on an automatic watering system with good drainage so it doesn't get over-watered (yes, that's a thing with tomatoes). We've even had tomatoes reseed themselves and come back on their own because they like the garden so much! Tomatoes break the rules a lot with us.

The mystery tomato

This year, we have four tomatoes growing there, enough for us to enjoy and share with family, and enough to turn into sauce or can if we want to. And we seem to be experiencing more of the same Giant Tomato Plant trend. Three of the four tomatoes in this area have far outgrown their tomato cages, which were custom-made to be bigger and stronger than what you'd find at a nursery. One of the tomatoes has pulled the cage up off the ground(!). We've had to tie up multiple branches that were so weighed down with fruit. The three big plants are taller than either Mom or me (and we're 5'5"). To give some perspective, the Black Krims are only supposed to have a spread (width of the plant) of 18 inches; it exceeded that by about double. In 115 days, we've created three monsters. And to make things even more interesting, we have a mystery tomato in our midst. We thought we bought two San Marzano tomato plants, which are red tomatoes that are great for saucing. What we ended up with is one San Marzano, and one plant with these yellowish tomatoes that have green stripes. I think it's a Green Zebra tomato, but I'm not 100% sure. It's tasty and full-flavored, and works well in salads. If we can find out what it is, I'd like to have one next summer.

I dare say it's another good year for tomatoes.

Lemon Verbena

Our lemon verbena "tree"

Hardly anyone I know is familiar with lemon verbena. It's not a common herb to grow in gardens around here. It's not something I've seen mentioned in any recipes I've come across; as far as I can tell, it's not a "core" herb in cooking. I've never seen it mentioned as an ingredient on any menu or food label. It smells amazingly like lemongrass, a staple in some Asian cuisines that I love for the unique flavor and the strong lemon scent. A whiff of fresh lemon verbena immediately brings to mind the Thai coconut milk soup that I adore. Sadly, I don't think it's interchangeable in the recipe; the flavors of lemongrass and lemon verbena are different. The only way I've seen lemon verbena used commercially is in scented products such as essential oils, lotions, candles, etc. I'm slowly becoming more and more earnest in using as many of our garden plants as possible in our food. I was determined to try and use it for something, especially since it has been our most prolific herb in the garden. The question was, could lemon verbena even be used for something that's not just edible, but delectable? Recently, we did some digging (metaphorically) to find out what is possible.

Turns out that yes, lemon verbena can be used. I found this site with a whopping 35 ideas on ways to incorporate lemon verbena in food. One of the simplest ways to use it is for a tea. I have never made tea from fresh herbs before (does that make me a tea amateur?); my tea experimentation has been limited to unusual and unique pre-made blends I've purchased. A little more research resulted in a very easy recipe: 1/4 cup of fresh herbs per 1 cup of boiling water, let it steep for a few minutes, then drink. Easy, right? Mom and I were in the mood for a hot cup of tea, so I picked four branches of lemon verbena to try this.

A close-up of lemon verbena leaves

I stripped and washed the leaves, ending up with about 1 cup of fresh herbs. I didn't chop or cut the leaves, preferring to leave them whole for this first test. We added the leaves to a teapot, and poured in water we had heated on the stove. After about 3-4 minutes, we poured and sipped the first cup--and our eyes widened. Where has this been all our lives? The flavor is light and fresh, and you definitely get that tone of citrus that you can smell from the fresh leaves. It's even slightly sweet, meaning you don't have to add anything to the tea. Just brew, sip and enjoy. After the success with the hot tea, we decided to try ice tea. It was even better better than the hot tea, in my opinion. The freshness becomes even more pronounced, and adding a little sweetener (a little goes a long way with this tea) heightens the natural flavors even more, making this a prime candidate for sweet tea if that's your preferred tea incarnation. In short, if you are a tea drinker, get yourself some fresh lemon verbena tea.

You can see the buds of the flowers coming in here.
These flowers will be trimmed off the plant soon.

We grow our lemon verbena in a raised herb bed that is exposed to the ground on the bottom. All of the herbs in this bed can send their roots deep if they want. That area of the yard is southern-facing and gets a lot of sun, meaning the lemon verbena is in full sun a majority of the day. The plant is watered daily, and had been coming in very lush and full this year. I also make sure to trim back the flowers; we do this with most of our herbs we don't harvest flowers from to help the plants concentrate their grow energy into their leaves, the part of these herbs we do use. Our lemon verbena has become more of a bushy tree, so if you're not looking for a plant quite that large, you can grow it in a pot to help control the size.

Lemon verbena surprised us, so much so that we made it the drink of choice when we celebrated July 4th. Give it a try. I bet it'll surprise you too.

Sidebar: Plant Rescue

When my school site closed because of the pandemic, we had to quickly adapt. I was not allowed daily access to my site, and I realized that there were some members of my library that would rapidly become casualties to the pandemic if not cared for: the plants. We had five pots of plants in the fiction room, and several more in our library office. Many of the plants have been at the library longer than I have, so I am understandably protective of them. Some of them have names; three of the pots from the fiction room contain the same kind of plant, so three years ago they earned the name Alvin, Simon, and Theodore (brownie points for recognizing the reference). Some of the plants have been added since I joined the library staff there. An old student of mine gave me a small succulent when she graduated in 2018. We rescued an orchid from the dumpster at the end of a school year when a teacher (I assume) threw it out after the blossoms faded. Two pots were given to us by a colleague who retired and didn't have a place for them at home. I couldn't let these plants die.

The solution? My home became a plant rescue. All of the fiction room plants and all of the plants in the office that require fairly frequent attention came home with me. Some of them have done a lot better with me at home than they ever did in the library. The orchid we rescued three years ago? She currently has eleven(!) blossoms on a single branch with number twelve about to open up. She has thoroughly settled into her spot on my bedroom window sill. The succulent has grown at least a third bigger than he was when he came home with me. Alvin, Simon, and Theodore all got a much-needed pruning and are coming back even bushier than they were; they seem to really like sitting on top of the cabinet in my front room.

And now, the madness is spreading. I'm compelled to rescue other plants in need. Our run to the nursery on Thursday resulted in the rescue of orchid number two, seen in the picture for this post. I didn't even think twice before claiming him from the counter at the register. All I saw was the pink post-it saying "FREE" before my hands seemed to move on their own and protectively clutch his pot. He seemed in really good health, so Mom and I can't figure out why someone was trying to get rid of him, unless they couldn't sell him without blossoms. He is currently sharing the shelf in my bedroom with one of the library plants. Scooter and I have named him Ricardo Shillyshally (more brownie points for this reference). I can't wait to see what color his blossoms will be, but it may be quite awhile before the next buds start to appear. If you have any guesses, you can leave a comment.

Place your bets for my next rescue plant...

Not Your Average Garden Lunch

Mom and I have settled into a routine. Two or three days a week, we go out and work together in the garden. The whole garden is quite large, so the work is never-ending. There's always a pot with a plant we need to replace, or a long branch that needs to be tied up or removed. This has been a fantastic year for roses, so there's always more faded roses to remove. There's herbs to trim, and fountains that need to be refilled because the kitties keep drinking out of them. We weed, we talk about what we'd like to do, we rearrange pots, we water plants, we tackle small garden projects, we harvest, and then...we cook. 

Cooking from the garden has become almost a religious experience. There's something spiritual about picking tomatoes that you then go and use in a salad or a sauce only minutes after they were still attached to the plant. It has become a never-ending source of satisfaction to incorporate the literal fruits of our labor into the food we enjoy at lunch. Cooking has become more experimental, which has added even more joy to the process. The results have been exquisite explosions of flavor and texture that any restaurant serving haute cuisine would be envious of. Today was no exception.

We needed to make a trip to the nursery to get some more colorful flowers and a couple of herbs we wanted to add, so we started the morning by prepping the pasta sauce for the pasta we planned on for lunch. A good pasta sauce is layered. You shouldn't dump all the ingredients in the pot at once because the aromas and flavors will never fully open. Fresh ingredients are a must, and the old-fashioned methods are sometimes better than the modern ones. In my family, any good cook has a wooden chopping bowl for chopping herbs and garlic; my mother and I both have our own. The scent of the garlic and herbs wafting up as you chop is a heady perfume, a sign of good Italian cooking about to happen. 

Our pasta sauce started with olive oil and loose mild Italian sausage meat. We wanted a hearty sauce, hence the meat. If you're looking for something lighter, stick with just herbs and veggies. After the sausage cooked through, in went the diced onion. Next came the chopped garlic and herbs, including basil that we grow ourselves. In went chopped San Marzano tomatoes from our garden; this is a great tomato for cooking. Once those flavors opened up, it was time to get serious. And by serious, I mean wine, a cabernet sauvignon. The wine helps to deglaze the bottom of the pot and adds amazing body and flavor to the finished product (pro tip: don't use any wine in your cooking that you wouldn't drink by the glass--trust me!). Once the wine cooked down, we added the last ingredient: tomato sauce Mom made herself from a previous year's San Marzanos. We brought it to a simmer, covered it, and left it to slowly cook while we went to the nursery.

When we returned, we planted the few things we purchased, then went to work on the rest of our lunch. By the time we sat down, we had bruschetta, salad, porpeta (essentially patties made from ravioli filling), penne pasta with the sauce, and biscotti. As Mom is so fond of saying, "this is all we have." Each dish had something from the garden. The pasta had tomatoes and basil we grew. The bruschetta had our own tomatoes, shallots, and zucchini. The salad had our own cucumber and vinegar. The porpeta had our own herbs and swiss chard. Each bite had us in ecstasy, almost like some illicit form of dining. "This is soooo goooood!" "Oh my god, did you taste this?" And when we paired it with the wine that had gone into the sauce...absolute perfection. Food tastes so much better when you grow it and make it yourself. 

And for today's garden surprise, we discovered the parsley we thought we bought is actually celery. Looks like we'll be growing that too now! We've been gardening for years and were so confident at the nursery. I guess this is proof that even "experienced" gardeners can still be surprised. It'll be perfect in the box that currently has the last remaining sprigs of lettuce...

Cooking Librarian Remix

Day 1 of the veggie garden

My last post was made over 5 years ago. At the time, it didn't feel like I needed this blog anymore. So I started another one with a different focus, but that one didn't last long either. I wasn't feeling inspired anymore. I didn't feel like I had anything to say, anything worth sharing. Things felt...stagnant. Well, many things have changed since then.

As a cook, the source of my food has become more important to me as I get older and more experienced with cooking (and eating). To me, the connection between the garden and the kitchen table has never been more evident. Scooter and I make weekly trips to the local Farmer's Market, where I've found more aromatic herbs, juicier peaches, fresher lettuce, and tastier strawberries than I've ever been able to find in our local chain supermarket. To be fair, the supermarket has fine produce; what the Farmer's Market has is just better. As a bonus, I can also support the smaller farms and businesses in my area.

But relishing such delectable organic food got me thinking. My mother and I had always wanted to do a big vegetable garden that we would cycle crops through so we could harvest year-round. The thought of tomatoes, string beans, zucchini, lettuce, root vegetables, and others that we could grow and harvest ourselves was so very tempting. Since we both love to cook, it seemed like a no-brainer. The problem was finding the time to get the garden going and established. She was always doing something church-related, or chores around the house, or running errands with my dad. I had a full-time job, plus a year ago I started a teaching credential program. Neither one of us had the time or the energy to attempt such a project.

And then in March the world fell apart. The schools closed, so I suddenly found myself with some unexpected time on my hands. Everything else closed, so there was nowhere for us to go: no picnics at the park, no camping (or travel of any kind), no eating out. Everything. Stopped. It was a particularly difficult time for me. I missed my students dearly, I was worried about my dad (not related to COVID, but a story for another day), I was worried about Scooter who still had to report to work, shopping for food had suddenly become A Big Thing, and my mental health was starting to decline. Mom and I decided that now was the time for the garden. We needed something therapeutic, something positive we could do in the middle of all this negativity, and we would become more autonomous with sourcing some of our food. So we sketched out a plan, called up our local nursery--who was thankfully doing deliveries--and put in an order of veggies.

Back in April when we planned out the raised beds and planted all of our new, tender plants, we could not have foreseen the amazing things that have come out of this project. Every day in the garden has become a much-needed refuge, a chance to step back from the world and take a breath to regroup. We have poured hours and hours into our little oasis, and it has responded in kind. Our garden has become the perfect compliment to our mutual love of cooking, so my blog will be used to record our gardening and cooking "experiments." I don't work from a recipe much anymore, so I don't know if I'll be posting many. But I promise to share what I can on what I do in the kitchen and in the garden. 

Step into my oasis. A ogni uccello il suo nido è bello. Home sweet home.