A Rose By Any Other Name Would Still Be A Physalis

Groundcherry, wintercherry, Cape gooseberry, poha. Physalis. An orange-yellow fruit in a charming paper husk which has nothing to do with cherries or gooseberries. It's more closely related to tomatoes (though sweet and tangy rather than savory) and needs similar conditions (and suffers from similar problems) to grow. And it's my wild card. That one crazy plant you are pretty sure won't grow for you, will probably curl its toes up and die before it has even gotten started, but you try anyway. Because if it does work...

It needs warmer conditions than I will probably be able to give it and even with my walk-in plastic greenhouse, the summer may still be too short for it to produce mature fruit. But I love them. I like them raw as a snack or in fruit salads and they are apparently nice cooked in pies or jammed. I didn't buy the seed, but instead saved it from some physalis I bought at ASDA. I don't usually save seed from store-bought fruit and vegetables as most are F1 hybrids (the offspring of two genetically different parents whose seed will NOT produce true-to-type. F1 Hybrids), but a very cursory google search seemed to imply that this wouldn't make a difference with physalis. So I happily munched through a bag and saved a few seeds. A couple of weeks ago I planted five seeds into a pot (peat-free MPC with vermiculite) and placed that into a sealed plastic bag. Five seeds germinated and so far five little plants are growing.

I'm feeling lucky this year. This could be the year my wild card pays off.

What's your wild card for this growing season?

Spray with Acid and Beat with Sticks

Tomatoes and squash never fail to reach maturity. You can spray them with acid, beat them with sticks and burn them; they love it.  --S. J. Perelman

Tomatoes! If you promise not to tell, I'll share the list of tomato varieties that I have. But please don't tell anyone; it's embarrassing...

Red Siberian

Silvery Fir Tree

Jelly Bean Red and Yellow

Zapotec Pleated
Tigerella
German Lunchbox
Christel's Plum
Tumbling Tom
Cuore di Bue
Harbinger
Gardener's Delight
Minibel
Red Zebra
Polish Linguisa
Principe Borghese
Kenilworth/King George
Losetto
Piccolo
Atkin's Stuffing
Mortgage Lifter
Nepal
Maja
TOGI
Giant Plum
Sweet Pea Currant

Cream Sausage                   

Yellow Stuffer                     
Millefleur
Goldkrone
Golden Sunrise
Golden Queen
Black Cherry
Cherokee Purple
Lime Green Salad
Hillbilly
Pink Plum
Snow White
Black Truffle
French Black
Green Velvet
Brad’s Black Heart
Blue OSU

You see what I mean? But I love tomatoes and I really love heritage tomatoes...their names, shapes, colors. It makes it very hard to choose which ones to grow, so before I even looked over my list, I capped it at 10. The varieties I chose are:

Piccolo
Losetto
Goldkrone
Blue OSU
Red Siberian
French Black
Black Truffle
Yellow Stuffer
Zapotec Pleated
Silvery Fir Tree
Snow White

And if you're better at counting than I am, you will have noticed a problem with that list. Oh well.

These varieties are all new to me this year. I've put aside a few old favorites (such as Black Cherry and Cream Sausage) to see if I can find some new old favorites. A bit risky, but I'm hoping it pays off. I chose these particular varieties so that I would have a mix of colors and shapes and also a few of them (namely Red Siberian and Silvery Fir Tree) are supposed to do well in shorter growing seasons.

I sowed them all the same way I did my eggplants (both plants needing similar growing conditions): in a yogurt pot using peat-free compost mixed with vermiculite. The pots have all been sealed into bags and will stay there until they germinate.

So, if you're growing your own tomatoes from seed this year (and you really should -- it's so easy and there's a much greater choice than if you buy them as plants from a garden center -- or even as tomatoes from a grocery store), you'd better get sowing because they need a long growing season to do well.

How many varieties will you have in your garden this summer?

The Great Eggplant Experiment

I've never tried to grow eggplants (aubergines) before. I like eating them, they're pretty, there's enough variety amongst them to satisfy the pickiest of gardeners (in appearance, if not taste). But they can be a bit tricky to grow in the UK. It originated on the Indian sub-continent, so needs more warmth, light, and a longer growing season than we normally get. So I've never bothered to give it a try. But this year I have a plan. I've started my seed off (January 30th) already, to give them the longest growing season possible. And I've also acquired a plastic greenhouse (a 'blowaway') to put them in after the frosts. This will hopefully give them more warmth and light than my windowsill could ever afford.

I'm trialling three types. 'Black Enorma,' 'Little Prince,' and 'Szechuan.' The first (seed from Thompson & Morgan) is supposed to crop early, but prolifically. The second (seed bought from a garden center in NY) is supposed to be early and small enough to grow in containers. The third one (seed from a seed swap) is supposedly very tasty and performs well in the British climate. We shall see.

Seeds in their mini-greenhouse

The first one was up today - a little 'Black Enorma.'

You can just about see it...

They were all sown into peat-free compost mixed with perlite (in yogurt pots with holes cut in the bottom). Then placed in a tray with water in it and put into a bag to make a mini-counter greenhouse. I open the bag daily to ventilate it. I keep them on a sunny counter, but away from my windows for now as they get really chilly.

And what do I plan to do with my bountiful eggplant harvet, you ask? Why this...

Fried Eggplant and Garlic Dip
3 Tb. oil
Eggplant, cut into small pieces
1c water
3-4 cloves of garlic, sliced
5 tsp sugar
1 tsp cornstarch
2 Tb soy sauce

Heat the oil and add the eggplant, cooking till soft. Add the water and garlic and simmer (making sure the garlic does not burn). In a bowl, combine the rest of the ingredients and then add to the pan. Cook until sauce is thickened. Serve with pita.

So what eggplants are you growing this year? And what do you plan on doing with them?