thoughts on tomatoes
If you've ever referred to the plants as trees, shrubs, hedges, or a grove, you might have grown tomatoes.
If you've ever referred to pruning as "thinning out the understory", you might have grown tomatoes.
If you've ever used 6 foot stakes and string as the only things large enough to build a tomato cage, you might have grown tomatoes.
(If you've ever lost a tomato cage somewhere inside the plant because you forgot to remove it some time in June, you might have grown tomatoes.)
If you've ever had to move those wooden stakes outside of the 4' x 4' bed the plant is in, because it has outgrown that space, you might have grown tomatoes.
If finding all the fruit entails lying on your back underneath the plant and squinting - because you can't see the interior branches well enough while standing - you might have grown tomatoes.
If in one weekend you have ever canned three quarts of salsa and 3 quarts of mincemeat - from one plant - and still had more ripe fruit left over - you might have grown tomatoes.
If you've ever dropped a hot quart jar of mincemeat beside the stock pot of boiling water because the kitchen tongs you have are insufficiently grippy to lower it into the pot - you might need actual canning equipment. Fortunately, string works really well.
If you've ever referred to pruning as "thinning out the understory", you might have grown tomatoes.
If you've ever used 6 foot stakes and string as the only things large enough to build a tomato cage, you might have grown tomatoes.
(If you've ever lost a tomato cage somewhere inside the plant because you forgot to remove it some time in June, you might have grown tomatoes.)
If you've ever had to move those wooden stakes outside of the 4' x 4' bed the plant is in, because it has outgrown that space, you might have grown tomatoes.
If finding all the fruit entails lying on your back underneath the plant and squinting - because you can't see the interior branches well enough while standing - you might have grown tomatoes.
If in one weekend you have ever canned three quarts of salsa and 3 quarts of mincemeat - from one plant - and still had more ripe fruit left over - you might have grown tomatoes.
If you've ever dropped a hot quart jar of mincemeat beside the stock pot of boiling water because the kitchen tongs you have are insufficiently grippy to lower it into the pot - you might need actual canning equipment. Fortunately, string works really well.