All posts in category Tomatoes

The Best Laid Plans

Planning the farm usually begins in November. Well, I start talking about it in June, but the real action happens after we’ve cleaned out the garden beds and stacked wood for the furnace. We have to consider space, planting times, relationships to previous years’ crops and next year’s crops, favorite plant varieties, new ones, and materials to purchase.

But our success relies on something we can’t control: the weather.

Today, it feels like a crisp October morning with the promise of rain. The air is chilled, the breeze is moist, and bed didn’t want to give me back to the world. It’s a stark contrast to the last few months. In June and July, we suffered through a string of 95-103F temperatures, and some nights, the thermometer didn’t dip below 80. I say “suffered” because we don’t have central air conditioning on the farm… and we’re still feeling the effects in the garden.

Our tomatoes didn’t flower because of the hot temperature. Spinach bolted before it even developed baby leaves. We couldn’t sow new seeds because the soil temperature was too high for germination. The ground has cracked from the lack of rain. Today will be 10 weeks since our last measurable precipitation on the farm.

This week, we took advantage of the cooler temps and sowed some leafy greens seeds. When I tilled the rows, I noticed that our irrigation tape had left a trail of mineral deposits along the rows.

The weather has left us struggling to meet our CSA commitment. Our friends’ farms post photos of their tomato harvest on their Facebook pages, leading us to wonder what happened on our place and if we could have done something differently.

If you’ve read to this point, I should tell you that my life is not all doom and gloom. We took a short vacation to a state park this week, and enjoyed the break. The boys went fishing, we tooled around in a paddle boat, and enjoyed a dinner at Main Street Cafe in Louisville. (We recommend the chicken and noodles and the onion rings, both house made.) It was great to get away for a couple of days.

Every year brings challenges. We have to face facts and adapt. But nothing has scared us off yet.

-Brian

Black Sheep Farms Plant Sale

When we started Black Sheep Farms, Kelly and I wanted to share our love of growing food and flowers with our community. After all, we were lucky enough to have family and friends who passed along their wisdom and advice to help us get started.

Many times, people ask us for tips about how to start gardens and where to buy seeds and plants. We are eager to reveal our favorite sources, but we understand that not everyone wants to buy a packet of 250 seeds for their backyard garden. So, this year, we are helping a little more by offering plants for sale.

The Black Sheep Farms plant sale is open on Saturdays, April 28th and May 5th from 12-5pm. The farm is located at 12808 N 192nd St, which is the NW corner of Hwy 36 and 192nd St.

Since we specialize in chemical-free, non-GMO, heirloom varieties for our farm, we have grown the same for you. We have started hundreds of vegetables, flowers, houseplants, and herbs, and we have transplanted fruit plants and bushes, too.

Some of the items we have include:

eight tomato varieties, such as Cherokee Purple, Isis Candy, and Hawaiian Pineapple
raspberries (red and blackcap)
strawberries
bushes and perennials, including curly willow, begonia, and liropie
seven herbs, like lavender, lemon basil, and Thai basil
King of the North bell peppers and sheepnose pimento
ornamentals and houseplants, like jade plant, ferns, aloe, and purple heart

Of course, these are plants you can’t find at a hardware store. We have taken care to schedule this sale near our last frost date so you will have the best possible time to plant in your garden. Thank you for continuing to support our farm.

-Brian

5 Comments

by blacksheepfarms on April 7, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in Flowers, Seed Starting, Tomatoes, Vegetables

Posted by blacksheepfarms on April 7, 2012

http://blacksheepfarms.com/2012/04/07/black-sheep-farms-plant-sale/

How Long Until July?

Tonight, Kelly made tomato cream soup from the very last of the fresh tomatoes. It marked the end of another year.

Tomatoes are the stars of the farm. Sure, people like to see the pigs, and there are fleeting treats like garlic scapes, but tomatoes hold a special place in our hearts. We grow 8-12 varieties each year. Over the years, we’ve cared for a rainbow: White Wonder, Cherokee Purple, Aunt Ruby’s German Green, Brown Berry, Blondkopfchen, Black Krim and more.

During the winter, we scour the seed catalogs, dreaming of warm weather. We start our tomato plants from seed in March, transplant them in May and harvest the first arrivals at the end of July. That’s only nine months away. Do you think we can wait that long?

-Brian

How to make yummy tomato sauce

These days, when I am not out working in the fields, you can generally catch me in the kitchen. I’m either making apple sauce or tomato sauce. Many people ask me how to make tomato sauce and there are as many recipes as their are tomato varieties, but this is how I make it.

I am a pretty low maintenance kinda gal, so my method is to dump whatever I happen to have at the time.

I wash my tomatoes, generally the split or damaged ones. Then I core them and cut out any bad spots. I tear them in half and place them on a jelly roll pan (you could also use a 13 x 9 pan). Then, I pile on anything else I have around, onions and garlic (of course!), peppers, eggplant, celery, etc. A little salt and pepper and then sprinkle on some olive oil. Place in the oven for about 20-30 minutes at 350.

Once that is done, throw in some fresh herbs. Then, you have two options. Dump it all into a food processor or blender, or put it in a stockpot. I put mine in a stockpot and let it simmer on an extremely low heat to let the herbs blend in. Then, I use a handheld blender to mix it all up in the stockpot. You can make it as chunky or smooth as you like. Since I don’t skin my tomatoes, I blend it pretty well so all the skins will get chopped up. Then you can either can it, or pour the cooled sauce into freezer bags and freeze it.

Now, if you are thinking that this recipe looks great, but you really would rather not make your kitchen into a sauna when it’s already 90 degrees outside, don’t worry. Wash your tomatoes and place them whole into a freezer bag. Pull them out when the weatherman announces our next blizzard and you’ll have plenty to do to keep you occupied AND well fed!

2 Comments

by blacksheepfarms on August 30, 2010 • Permalink

Posted in DIY, Recipes, Show me How, Tomatoes

Posted by blacksheepfarms on August 30, 2010

http://blacksheepfarms.com/2010/08/30/how-to-make-yummy-tomato-sauce/

Attention!

Ladies and Gentlemen, we have just harvested the first tomato of the season.

This is huge for us! Last year, we lost our tomatoes to late season blight. It was a major setback for us and expecially hard since we are such tomatoes lovers. I never would have imagined that losing tomatoes would make me question myself so much. But as I was pulling those vines out last year, I was asking myself if I was truly cut out for this kind of life. Maybe I would be better off in the city with a small garden in the backyard, I thought.

I have checked this years tomato plants every day since starting them in February; examining each and every one to check for signs of disease. So when I saw this little guy, I had to have him! As you can see from the picture, he’s still a little green on top, but I couldn’t resist. And the flavor? Words just can’t describe…

Beautifully, after I took my first bite, ‘Here Comes the Sun’ played on my ipod. So fitting.

Maybe I’m meant to do this after all.

~Kelly

All posts in category Tomatoes

The Best Laid Plans

Black Sheep Farms Plant Sale

How Long Until July?

How to make yummy tomato sauce

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