What happens when we skip a day picking squash?

They just keep growing.  A few of zucchinis are stuffing size now.

The squash we should have picked yesterday, plus today's harvest, is below with some windfall Flavor Delight Apriums and Harcot Apricots (the ones with the red blush).  These two varieties are well-adapted here, along with the apricots Golden Sweet (commercial variety, just coming off patent and becoming available for home growers), Robada (commercial, sweet pit variety, needs a pollenizer, developed by USDA) and Tomcot (best with a pollenizer)

Today was the best gardening day we've had in a while.  I also transplanted some extra seedlings from a row of melons.  They HATE that when they have true leaves, but I think some of them will make it.  Tied up the cucumbers, too.

I'm not much on gardening in containers in summer in our hot climate, but I planted Red Russian kale in a pot with some chrysanthemums last fall.  I used it often in salads with angel hair-cut cabbage.  It is more tender than most kale varieties.

It's bolting now.  You can see its skinny seedheads and yellow blossoms behind the chrysanthemums, which seem to have picked an odd time to bloom again.  The color of Red Russian kale is great with chrysanthemums with blue-green leaves and purplish or pink flowers.

I also threw caution to the wind this year and planted some peppers (Mariachi and Monster Jalapeno) in a pot with some marigolds.  They're next to a pot o' ground cherries (first time I'm trying these), in the afternoon shade of a couple of big English roses.  Most places, I would not recommend shade for hot peppers.  Here, in a pot, yes.  I'll let you know how they do.

Early Harvest, 2013

Above, an all-yellow early harvest: Two Yellow Perfection tomatoes (a variety from England - smaller than a ping pong ball), three Sungold tomatoes (even smaller) and one baby Meteor yellow zucchini. They're nestled among the prettiest weed of the season, Mexican Evening Primrose.   Yellow Perfection is a pleasant tomato with some sweetness, on the mild side but not bland.  The great Sungold has not come into its own yet this season.  Both varieties had tough skin on these first tomatoes (on the plant before transplant).  

We've only had a few Sungold tomatoes and one other Yellow Perfection (given away) so far this season. Should have started a couple of weeks earlier. Next year. . . .

Update: the day after I harvested the first squash of the year above, I got a Magda, a Zephyr and a Sweet Zuke (examples pictured in a previous post here. )  Princess Kitty Darla has  more kitty friends now than she did in the picture at the link and may now qualify as Queen.   I also got a Butter Scallop the second day (looks like its name) and a Supersett (yellow crookneck).  Same old seeds I had in 2011, pretty much.   By May 11, two days after the first zucchini was harvested, we had a total of 19 squashes.  Once these plants start . . . I also planted Peter Pan, a scallop, from quite old seed.  It is behind the others in development.  

 The lettuce above is now too bitter to eat, but it was nice while it lasted.  Doesn't take much potting mix to grow cut-and-come-again leaf lettuce in winter here.  These are growing in trays from supermarket barbecued chicken.  My favorite cool-season crops this year were Tatsoi and its later blossoms, broccoli and Red Russian kale.  UPDATE for Gilly:   Tatsoi is one of the cutest edible plants ever, and would look nice with pansies or other low-growing plants.  I planted Red Russian Kale in a pot with some mauve and pink chrysanthemums.

2013 tomato wish list

Varieties in bold type below are on my "wish list". If you want information or seeds for another variety, let me know. SEED CATALOGS ARE COMING IN. If you live in the Valley and want to start your own plants or supply your favorite nursery with seeds to start a favored variety for you, you need to act fairly soon. These are the varieties we planted this year:
German Johnson regular leaf vs. Big Pink Hybrid (Burpee)

Brandy Boy Hybrid vs. Pink Brandy Master Hybrid 

Black Krim vs. Black Prince (already know Nyagous does well here)
Cherokee Purple

Jetsetter vs. Early Girl 

Better Boy vs. Champion

 Big Beef vs. Park Whopper vs. Goliath vs Beefmaster

 Yellow Brandywine vs. Golden Jubilee vs. Lemon Boy
Solar Power (Burpee) vs. Orange Wellington 

Husky Cherry Red vs. Cherry Punch (new variety, compact plants)

Black Cherry vs. Chocolate Cherry

Sun Gold vs. SunSugar
2013 CHERRY AND GRAPE TOMATOES
Yesterday, December 14, we had a light frost, which did not affect our surviving cherry tomatoes. The best-flavored ones still in the garden are Chocolate Cherry, a dark-colored tomato which is picked while it still has green shoulders (like most dark tomatoes. It was not outstanding in hot weather. It is available from Bonnie Plants, in their children's garden series. Black Cherry, the favorite of tomato nuts, does not seem to be particularly well-suited to our climate. For those with cooler summers, be aware that it is sort of late for a cherry.
We also compared Sun Gold and SunSugar. Both were lovely at certain times during the summer, but are not so great now. Sun Gold is the favorite of tomato nuts for its unique, fruity flavor. Sun Sugar is even sweeter, but less fruity. It is resistant to a couple of tomato diseases. Our red varieties of cherry types were nothing to brag about. Many people who like "tomato flavor" recommend Husky Cherry Red, a Short Internode Indeterminate variety. I like sweet cherries better. Cherry Punch was not good. Plants looked nice, though. Neither of our compact red cherry plants look so good this time of year.
Reds to try in 2013: Sweet Million (sweet, disease-resistant) and/or Sweet Baby Girl (Compact indeterminate, some disease resistance).
Napa Grape is a red Burpee grape we grew one year. It is very sweet and maintains its quality in cool weather. Burpee generally doesn't release information on disease resistance. Also recommended for the Valley: Golden Honey Bunch. Might also try Rosalita (pink grape) Sweet Quartz (pink cherry) Jenny Hybrid, Orange Paruche, Ladybug and/or Cherry Roma. Already have seeds.
2013 COCKTAIL/SALAD-SIZED WISH LIST
Moravski Div (Wonder of Moravia) The only extra-early tomato recommended by tomato expert Carolyn Male. May be the only tomato I try to plant in a container (to protect during frost). Semi-determinate. Container tomato growers in cooler-summer climates may want to try some of the new internationally developed (by amateurs) Dwarf Indeterminate varieties.
Mountain Magic F1. Cocktail tomato (large cherry) recommended for flavor. Good choice for humid climates also, as it is blight-resistant and resistant to several other tomato diseases.
Flamme (Jaune Flammee) Old French cocktail-sized tomato, intense flavor, holds color when dried or roasted. Productive.
Bulgarian Triumph (the round ones). Love the name. Not real early. Or Brandysweet Plum.
Moskvich Does well here. Starts early, keeps going in heat.
Cosmonaut Volkov from Ukraine. Does well here. Nice flavor.
Nyagous - a "black" tomato, picked with green shoulders. Beautiful little tomatoes, my healthiest plants the year I grew it.
AAA Sweet Solano - Yellow/orange striped tomato - sweet, firm, beautiful, on the late side.
DARK TOMATOES, STANDARD TO LARGE
Indian Stripe, the slightly smaller, slightly earlier, slightly more heat-tolerant cousin of Cherokee Purple. May be picked fully ripe, unlike most dark tomatoes. Cherokee Purple is wonderful, but is not productive here.
JD's Special C Tex or Gary O Sena - have grown before. Similar to Cherokee Purple. Large.
Burgundy Traveler - Better than Arkansas traveler, medium-sized.
No larger "blacks" this year, I think. Nyagous may be my only "black". No luck with other blacks last year.

Moldy Mounds of Dirt (Treat for Kids Only)

These are prepared on the Rice Krispies Treats model with cocoa-flavored cereal, for Trunk or Treat parties. Ugly -- gummy worm emerging from each mound of dirt optional.

Regular Batch
Spray a very large bowl and a 9 x 13 inch pan with non-stick cooking spray.  Line a cookie sheet with waxed paper if you intent to make shaped mounds rather than rectangles.  If desired, crush chocolate cookie wafers to decorate the finished treats (I took some Oreos apart and used the halves with no filling to crush, putting the remaining halves together for "double stuff" Oreos). Reserve crushed cookies in a bowl.

Measure about 8 1/2 cups Cocoa Pebbles or Cocoa Dyno-Bites (13 oz. box) into the very large bowl you have sprayed with non-stick spray. Have a sturdy spatula or large spoon ready for stirring.

Melt 1/4 cup butter (1/2 stick) in a microwave, in a large microwave-proof bowl. Pour in a 10 oz. bag of marshmallows and stir to coat marshmallows with butter. Melt marshmallows completely in the microwave on high power for about 1 1/2 minutes, stirring once at 45 seconds. Pour and scrape melted marshmallow mixture into cereal and quickly stir to coat the cereal. Scrape into the prepared 9 x 13 inch pan and press evenly into the pan with buttered hands (or spray hands with non-stick cooking spray). If you intend to serve as bars, sprinkle some cookie crumbs over the cereal mixture and press into the top if desired, to make the top look "dirty". Also makes the bars less sticky (you could also coat the bottom of the pan with cookie crumbs before adding cereal if desired).  Cut when cooled. Cover tightly to store.

If you want to make "moldy mounds of dirt", score the warm cereal mixture quickly into serving-sized pieces. With buttered hands, shape each piece into a flat-bottomed mound, shaping it around half of a gummy worm if desired, so that the other  half of the worm emerges from the "mound of dirt". Firm cereal mixture around the worm. Roll the mound in crushed cookies to give the appearance of an uneven, dirty surface. Press cookie crumbs into cereal mixture and set on waxed paper-lined cookie sheet to cool.

Big Batch

Prepare as above, using a 16 oz. bag of marshmallows, 13 cups of cereal and 6 Tablespoons of butter. Marshmallows will take a little longer to melt and you will need BIG bowls both for the microwave and the cereal. I put the mixture in a  10 x 15 inch baking dish(sprayed with non-stick cooking spray as above) to score it into serving sections, then quickly shaped the pieces around gummy worms and coated with cookie crumbs. I set the mounds on a 1/2 hotel sheet lined with waxed paper, but you could use 2 smaller cookie sheets. I got 31 mounds of dirt, most of them quite large for a kid (slightly smaller than a cupcake).

NOTE: If you get a 42 oz. bag of Cocoa Dyno-Bites cereal, you can make 2 big batches if you substitute a cup or two of another ingredient for cereal in each batch -- nuts, coconut, another kind of cereal, etc. I would not try to make a double batch at one time - just too big. Separate batches are much more feasible.

Mongolian Beef

Quick to make. Guys especially seem to like this spicy/sweet/salty recipe when they are dragging a little after a hard day of work. I adapted this recipe from the one linked at the bottom of this post, at Pink Bites. I reduced the sugar (the original was too sweet for me, but you could add some back if you prefer) and substituted flour for cornstarch (corn allergy). Because I was now making a sauce with flour rather than mixing cornstarch with the beef, I switched the brown sugar to white sugar to make it easier to mix with the flour. You could do the same thing with cornstarch or arrowroot, but use only half as much as you would measure if using flour. A sauce made with arrowroot should be added right at the end of cooking, as it will thin out again if over-cooked.

I usually don't use the maximum amount of garlic. I often add both hot pepper flakes (or ground hot pepper) and a fresh Ancho/Poblano chile. I usually use more ginger than in the original recipe, and if I don't have fresh ginger, I use a little ground ginger.

Serves two or three. You can easily double or triple the recipe if you have a large electric skillet. I often make this with cube steak, though Mexican-style Milanesa also works. If I have last-minute guests, I may start some ground beef cooking before adding the steak.

Mongolian Beef (corn free)


1 pound of flank steak, cube steak, Milanesa or other lean steak
1 Tablespoon canola oil or similar oil for stir-frying


1/2 teaspoon to 1 Tablespoon grated or minced ginger (peeled)

Up to 1 tablespoon minced garlic (about 2 -3 large cloves)

1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes or ground red pepper (cayenne if you're brave)
AND/OR 1 fresh Ancho, Pasilla or other mild chile, seeded and sliced

1/2 cup cold water

1/2 cup low sodium soy sauce

1/4 cup granulated sugar  (you can add 2 to 4 Tablespoons brown OR additional granulated sugar)
1 to 2 Tablespoons flour (depending on desired thickness of sauce)



3 large green onions, 6 small green onions or 1 small regular or sweet onion

Cooked white or brown rice, and/or stir-fried vegetables for serving
(shredded Napa cabbage or similar greens, mushrooms, onions, celery, etc)

1. Begin to cook the rice while you prepare the rest of the meal.

Mince garlic and grate or mince ginger, set aside. Prepare and slice fresh chile (if used) in about 1/4 inch by 1 inch strips. Peel onion and slice into 1/4 inch by 1 inch strips or trim green onions (both white and green parts) and slice once vertically, then chop into 1 inch slices. Set aside.

Slice steak thinly across the grain, then slice into short strips.

2. For the sauce, mix granulated sugar and flour. Stir in the brown sugar (if used), cold water, and soy sauce. Save until meat is browned.

3. Heat a large wok, heavy pan or electric skillet to medium-high. Add the oil and then the meat, stirring until it is all browned (should not take long). Add the garlic, ginger, red pepper and sliced fresh chile if used. Continue cooking and stirring until garlic softens a little.

Stir the sauce ingredients to suspend the flour, pour into the wok/pan, stir until thickened and let it cook along with the meat for a few minutes.

4. You can cook down the sauce to reduce it to a sweeter, more concentrated flavor or leave it thinner. Add green onions at the last minute so the green parts will stay green and the white parts crunchy. Serve it hot with rice and/or stir-fried vegetables or salad. It may not seem like you have much sauce, but the sauce is quite sweet and salty, and goes a long way on rice. Serves two, or maybe three if you serve it with veggies, etc.

Allergy Information: Check soy sauce for wheat or corn products.

Mongolian Beef
 from Pink Bites
1 lb of flank steak or cube steak, thinly sliced crosswise

1/4 cup of cornstarch

3 teaspoons of canola oil

1/2 teaspoon grated ginger (about 1/2 inch piece)

1 tablespoon minced garlic (about 2 -3 large cloves)

1/2 cup water

1/2 cup low sodium soy sauce

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes

3 large green onions, sliced

Rice, for serving

1. For the meat, make sure the steak slices are dry by patting them with a paper towel. Slice them into strips, then add the cornstarch to the beef. Place the slices in a strainer and shake off excess corn starch. Begin to cook the rice while you prepare the rest of the meal.

2. For the sauce, heat half of the oil in a large wok or pan at medium-high heat and add the garlic and the ginger. Immediately add the soy sauce, water, brown sugar and pepper flakes. Cook the sauce for about 2 minutes and transfer to a bowl. Don’t worry if the sauce doesn’t look thick enough at this point. The corn starch in the beef will thicken it up later.

3. Place the meat in the same pan and cook, stirring until it is all browned (this is a quick thing). Pour the sauce back into the wok/pan and let it cook along with the meat.

4. You can cook down the sauce to reduce it to thicken or leave it thinner. Add the green onions on the last minute so the green parts will stay green and the white parts crunchy. Serve it hot with rice. Serves 2.

Little Squashes

Darla the Kitty Princess checks out a platter of summer squash in her flower border. Some of the ones she's looking over would qualify as "baby squash" - the kind I could never afford when I lived in Southern California and occasionally visited the upscale Irvine Ranch market.

I think the very cutest baby squashes are the scallop types (in white, all shades of green, pale yellow, deep yellow, rings,  stripes, and combinations) and the crooknecks. And "round zucchinis" have gone beyond the old European heirlooms and their progeny to standardized hybrids. They make for a fun picture arranged like billiard balls. But I'm not growing any of those this year.

Even though I've simplified our squash list, we've still got 8 plants of summer squash this year - way too many for one family, unless you plan on giving some away. Even if you give lots of squash away, you can be overwhelmed if you don't pick them young. The ones on the platter are:

Magda:   A pale green, fat Lebanese (Cousa) type bred in France. My favorite zucchini. First to produce this year, as usual.
Sweet Zuke:   Medium green with faint stripes, shaped something like the Cousa types when it gets bigger. I bought seeds for this variety as a darker companion to Magda. Tends to break at the neck when picked.
Spineless Beauty:   Zucchinis on a less-prickly, less-hairy plant. They're the ones in the photo with the blossoms still attached. How high-end is THAT? My favorite variety name for a "hairless" zucchini was "Kojac". This type really is more pleasant to pick than regular zucchini.
Meteor:   A deep yellow zucchini, very slim when young.  Apparently being dropped from production. Yellow zucchinis taste a lot more like green zucchini than like the yellow crooknecks and straightnecks. They probably have a different profile of phytonutrients than the green ones, so if you're a zucchini fan, growing both could be good for you.
Precious II:   A hybrid straightneck yellow squash which resists greening from a common squash virus.  They're the ones that look sort of like pale yellow bowling pins in the photo.
Zephyr:   The one in the photo that's yellow on top and pale green on the bottom. A unique squash bred by Johnny's Selected Seeds. Has a winter squash in its parentage, and is rather firm.  Nice flavor.  Reported to keep better in the fridge than most varieties.

I planted two plants each of Magda and Zephyr. Thought I had 9 plants in all, but the Butterstick I thought I planted turned out to be a melon. Maybe I'm a little crazy for planting so many. But the bounty doesn't last forever. Summer squashes tend to produce so much fruit that they seem to wear themselves out after a while.

In our yard, the yummy yellow squashes, both crookneck and straightneck, tend to succumb to disease and/or insects faster than the zucchini types. Here, it's possible to put in a fall crop of summer squash if the white flies and squash bugs aren't too bad and soil diseases don't get to the plants.

Recipes: Okie Squash and Tomatoes is a good recipe for people who are not wild about zucchini by itself. Skillet Lasagna with Shredded Zucchini works even for most people who don't like zucchini because of its texture.

Melons as Cucumbers? Plus: Apricots! and a Garden Update

MELONS AS CUCUMBERS
For me, part of the fun of gardening is doing a little experimentation.  Last year, I tried hybridizing a new melon variety:  Bidwell Casaba x Small Persian, to see if I would come up with anything close to a Crenshaw melon (the Crenshaw is reported to be derived from a Casaba and a Persian melon).  Maybe we'll see this summer.  Plants are in the ground along with some of our favorite melon varieties and a couple of new ones.

This year, I lost some of my cucumber seedlings to damping off fungus.  So on the cucumber trellis, I'm trying some melons which I plan to try harvesting as cucumbers. "Armenian Cucumbers" and related varieties like "Painted Serpent Cucumbers" are actually melons, after all. True cucumbers have a hard time producing palatable, non-bitter fruit here because of the heat and because it is hard to maintain an even water level in the soil. The variety Summer Dance is the best I've found so far here, and it must be grown vertically or in part shade in this climate. This year, I'm also giving a few other varieties a spot in the garden, in addition to the "melon as cuke" experiment. I'm not including Armenian, because of the folk tradition that growing it near regular melons will change their taste. Not sure it's true.  But why let this idea interfere with my experiment?

 One year, our late, great dog Sparky was trying to harvest a melon (Piel de Sapo type) and accidentally pulled up the whole plant.  He loved Summer Dance cucumbers, so I figured he mistook the melon for a cucumber.  We used some of the immature melons he pulled up with the plant like cucumbers (peeled and seeded).  They were sweeter than cucumbers, but quite similar. Our neighbor at the time told me that in the old days, his family ate immature honeydews as cucumbers. Yesterday, I planted out six varieties of melons on the cucumber trellis, along with a late planting of  "Summer Dance" cucumber and  "Poona Kheera (a brown-skinned cucumber from India). The melons are:

Honeydew Gold Rind: A honeydew melon which turns golden when ripe. Not too sweet, according to the description. From Willhite, 2005 seed. Pick on full slip if using as a melon.

Sprite: A crispy little white Asian melon. Tiny seeds from 1998 AND 2001. We'll see if they germinate.

Bartlett Hybrid honeydew from Burpee. 2007 seed. They've discontinued this one, which is why I got it on their bargain page in 2007. Supposed to taste like a Bartlett pear.

Lambkin: an early Piel de Sapo type hybrid with yellower skin. Kind of defeats the purpose of having a winter storage melon here if it matures early, so why not use as a cucumber?

Golden Crispy hybrid: another discontinued hybrid, not too different from this one. Crisp little melons are popular in Asia.

Gold Bar hybrid: Park bills this as the first cucumber/melon cross: a cross of Cucumis sativas (a cucumber) and Cucumis hystrix (a melon). But information I see on C. hystrix calls it the closest cousin to the cucumber. It's not a regular melon. It's hard to cross a cucumber with the melons we are familiar with. Even this cross-species "melon" has been hard for me to grown. Last chance for this batch of seeds.

Update: June 8, Lambkin and Summer Dance sprouted in their little seed protectors, which have now been removed Pictures of those later.

APRICOTS: We got our first apricot on June 2, a Royalty (not Royal). Second one yesterday.  Quality is much better than usual, probably due to the cooler weather this year. Not as mushy this year.  Maybe it's gotten less water during ripening than usual, too.  This is a really big apricot, and the fruits stayed on the tree in our recent windstorms (it's billed as a wind-resistant variety). I'm thinking that this is a good variety for the Salinas Valley.  It's a semi-freestone and there are other varieties out there which taste better.  But it's still an apricot.

Update:  On June 7, I picked our first Blenheim apricots which matured in reasonable weather.  No comparison with Royalty.  Blenheim's depth of flavor was remarkable, and its texture is far superior.  No wonder people go on orchard tours in the Santa Rosa Valley to taste it.  The variety Golden Sweet is said by Andy Mariani to be very similar, but more resistant to pitburn and brown rot.  I just have to convince a nursery to pick some up from the commercial vendor.  There should be some super-sweet varieties coming onto the nursery market soon, too.

I also picked a Harcot on June 8.  It was bigger than Blenheim, but not as big as Royalty.  Quality is much better than Royalty, not as good as Blenheim.  It's better suited to our climate, though.  Flavor Delight Aprium also has some ripe fruits.  Usually they ripen before or with Royalty.  They rank just under Harcot for flavor.  They're quite reliable here.

FRUIT TREES:  I finally got around to whitewashing the trunks of the new Pluot trees yesterday:  a Flavor King to replace the one Sparky's bathtub killed, a Flavor Grenade to replace the one Little Buddy chewed up when he was a puppy, and a Splash.  You're supposed to use a cheap white latex interior paint, diluted with an equal part of water.  I found a little jar of paint used for testing mixed paint colors which was perfect for this use.  I also renewed the whitewash on the cherry trees.

ONIONS AND LETTUCE: F. planted a bunch of seed for a short-day purple onion this spring, and they're bolting, so I advised him to dig them up. It's hard for him to understand that you plant some kinds of onions in spring and other kinds in fall. But he buries all onions so deep that they won't bulb up, anyway. These are woody, but he harvested and bunched them like scallions, anyway. Tied them with an onion stem.  He hates to waste food. We give him some space in the garden to grow the things he likes. He does better with tomatoes and winter squash than with onions. He also transplanted some lettuce a couple of weeks ago which was already too bitter to eat after a warm spell. He really hates waste, and I think he intended to grow it out for seed.  More seed than we could ever use. It's a pretty, but inferior, variety - a volunteer with tough, frilly leaves. I pulled them and put them in the compost bin so he wouldn't have to. There are still some in the front yard. He had started to transplant those to his garden plot, too. But I stopped him. Think I'll try to keep them from going to seed after they bloom. We have lots of lettuce seeds.

TOMATOES: I saw my first sphinx moth of the year last night. It's a shame that these fascinating moths lay eggs which turn into such destructive caterpillars. It will be time to break out the Bt spray (one of the most effective, specific biological insect controls around) soon, as the moths begin to lay eggs on the tomatoes. You can see the difference between a tobacco hornworm and a tomato hornworm if you scroll down here. I think the tobacco hornworm is more common in our garden. I only saw one of them on the tomatoes last year. Only sprayed Bt once. We also get the white-lined sphinx moth here. It's a beauty. According to Wikipedia, the caterpillars feed on tomatoes as well as a wide range of other plants. I'm not sure I've ever seen one on a tomato plant, though. Other sources don't seem to list tomato as a host. This is the green color variation of the caterpillar. Uncle Kent told us years ago about having to drive over a migration of green caterpillars in the Arizona desert. Guess it might have been these.

Our first tomato will be ripe soon. It's turning red. It's on an Early Girl plant we bought at a promotion at Home Depot in a gallon pot for about a dollar. The Ace we bought at the same time has good-sized fruit on it, too. I shaded the exposed ones yesterday with aluminum foil. Many of the other tomatoes bought as smaller plants also have fruit.

It's the fourth of June, and this is a late year for tomatoes here, but the fourth of June seems pretty early for a ripe tomato to people in most of the country.  The name of the Fourth of July tomato doesn't mean as much in areas like this as it does in the North, and it's not offered in nurseries here. I didn't grow it this year because I didn't start plants from seed. Tough skin, but does well in the heat here, becoming very sweet. But I may be planting Moravsky Div (Wonder of Moravia) as my really early tomato next year. Recommended by heirloom tomato expert Carolyn Male. Along with Bulgarian Triumph as a later, small, sweet tomato.

The lanky potato-leafed plant I bought as an Early Girl has largely recovered from its early sickly appearance and has some small fruits on it. Though the plant is not what you would call "lush" at this point. It's probably the maternal parent of Early Girl, which is reported to be a potato-leafed cultivar. There were lots of potato-leafed plants among the Early Girls at nurseries and box stores this year. Somebody left some self-pollenized tomatoes on the plant during production of the hybrid seeds, apparently. I'm surprised that this doesn't happen more often.