Mid-July Tomato Update

Wow, sorry I haven't posted anything in a while, the garden is keeping me busy! The tomatoes have finally started ripening, and I am already overwhelmed by the bounty we are receiving! I was lucky enough to have nice friends who contributed to this years tomato crop (thanks Bill, Nels and Angie), and my inability to say no to a free plant has gotten me in way over my head! I am pulling about 4 or 5 tomatoes a day right now, and I'm not including the various cherry types in that number (like the Jelly Bean's, Sweet 100's, and Black Cherry's pictured). I am growing a lot of heirlooms this year that I have never grown before, and not only are they really cool looking- the flavor is outstanding! The hybrids were early producers, and I already made a batch of salsa with them. I also canned my first batch of salsa verde using tomatillos (also pictured), and am almost ready to can another! There's a lot of talk about Late Blight going around, and thankfully we're not showing any signs of it yet (knock on wood). I'm almost anticipating it since the first time I tried growing heirloom tomatoes I got it, and I hadn't attempted heirlooms since! Now, I don't think I could go without heirlooms, although I admit they are a pain in the a$$ to grow organically. The Black Cherry tomato has officially made it to my Must-Have list. We will be growing it every year now as our main cherry tomato (until something better comes along). It has been a heavy producer, and the flavor of the tomatoes are to die for! Other heavy producers that I am antsy to try (they haven't ripened yet) would be the Black Krim and the Japanese Black Trifele. The black tomatoes have definetly peaked my interest this year, and I admit I didn't even wait to see how they tasted before ordering seeds for next year. The JBT (like how I just created an acronym?) has about ten medium sized tomatoes on it right now and is still blooming, and I think I counted 15 on the Black Krim which also still has blooms on it. As for tomatoes that won't be revisiting our garden again, I'll pass on the Green Zebra and Red Lightning, and the Lemon Boy is walking a fine line (but I'll keep him on the list until I find a better tasting yellow tomato). The funkiest tomato plant has been another heavy producer- the Henderson Winsall that I got from Nels. There's a possibilty the tags have been switched and that could be wrong on the name(that's the down side of gardening with a toddler, the plant tags go missing often!), but the picture below is a good example of what it's producing. The tomatoes are pretty twisted, and they are HUGE, and when they ripen they are a deep pink with yellow tones. Hope you are all starting to see success in your garden despite the odd weather-and keep an eye out for Late Blight!