YORKTON - The Yorkton and District Horticultural Society will be holding their next meeting on Wednesday, March 20 at 7:00 PM at the Yorkton Public Library.
We’ll start getting in the gardening frame of mind as gardeners Allona Zeiben, John Tropin, Frank Woloschuk speak to us about “ From Seed to Plant to Garden”. Come and get some practical advice, ideas and inspiration from these enthusiastic green thumbs! Everyone is welcome, you don’t have to be a member of the group to attend.
As I make my tea to sit down with you, it is a blustery day, hard to imagine that spring will soon be here. But it will! Looking through some garden photos the other day, I found a picture of purple cherry tomatoes that we grew one year. I don’t recall the name of them, ( I think it may have been Cherokee Purple) but they certainly added an exotic look to our summer salads.
For those of you who start your own tomatoes, you may have already got them going. It’s an interesting contrast, isn’t it, to see the healthy green seedlings close to a window, while a winter storm rages outside! I think with great fondness of happy memories as Mom grew her tomatoes each year. She loved to try new varieties; she’d be thrilled to see how many are available today!
Did you ever wonder whether different kinds of tomatoes have different flavors? Tomatoes were tomatoes for a long time…but then it seemed gardeners starting hearing about ‘low-acid’ tomatoes. Some people found tomato acid hard on their systems, but those who liked to can tomatoes had to worry that using tomatoes with supposedly less acid might result in a greater degree of spoilage, since the low-acid varieties had too little acid to safely prevent botulism. That’s why ¼ cup of lemon juice was added while canning.
Paler yellow varieties were thought to be lower in acid, but in reality they had a higher sugar content. Acid levels were actually very close to regular tomatoes. One article I read said that most tomatoes fell into a very similar amount of acid, really too close to call.
Another article in my homework led to another, and on more than one occasion, I read that some sources do not believe there is a ‘low-acid’ tomato; they are just sweeter. (One article had a list of 46 tomato varieties that were listed as low-acid but when tested, they really are not; the list included Golden Boy, Hillbilly Potato Leaf, Lemon Boy, and San Marzano).
I also read that the growing conditions of our tomatoes can affect acidity; overripe tomatoes have higher acidity, and tomatoes that are harvested later in the season have lower. Also, the types of fertilizer a gardener used may affect acidity.
Thanks to the numerous varieties of tomatoes, I think that most gardeners can find what suits their tomato tolerance. Perhaps the sweeter varieties do not cause the same issues. Also, there are so many wonderful cherry tomatoes, and the size itself can help the effect of too much acid. Munching on a small handful of cherry tomatoes might not cause the same issues that eating one large tomato might bring.
So there we have it: not a lot of hard facts about tomato acid, but a lot of varied ideas to think about. If sweeter varieties are working for those who prefer low-acid, those are the ones to plant and enjoy! Whatever kind we choose, they are a taste delight, especially when picked fresh and warm from the sun!
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