Organic Gardening Info from Peaceful Valley

So here I am with the rest of the story… (read the beginnings of the story here).

James and Maggie Coffee were migrant farm workers (commonly known as prune pickers at the turn of the century) and raised 5 children while traveling from farm to farm throughout the Salinas and Sacramento valleys.  One good thing about working on farms is that there is always food around.  One bad thing about it is that most farms grew single crops so there was a limited variety of things to choose from.

People tended to eat the same things day after day.  My Grampa Mel, #4 in the line up, used to talk about how the minute they got where they were staying for the season the entire family would immediately dig up and plant the garden.  It added variety to their diet and preserves for the winter.

Don’t stop reading here… (more…)

I’m a 6th generation California organic grower. My Great Great Great Grandfather Addison J. Bump, planted one of the very first orange groves in Calif. in the mid 1800s.

Here’s something I learned from his great granddaughter my great grama Maggie. Don’t throw out the vines that still have tomatoes. Instead hang them on the rafters of the barn (garage) in a place that they won’t freeze and they will keep ripening. They can be eaten, dried, or canned as you have enough for a batch.

I learned about ten years ago that you can also store them in bins or buckets off the vine. Clip the stem leaving the stepal (the little green star at the attachment on the tomato) but not any stem (it will poke holes as the tomatoes ripen) and put them all together in the bucket. Black plastic tree pots work great because of the holes in the bottom that allows some circulation.

Be sure to go through them often and see how they are doing. Pick out and keep the ripening ones toward the top so they don’t get squished. These aren’t good for fresh eating but make great sauce or pickle relish which I will talk about next week.

Grama Maggie had a method to her madness as well as a great green tomato relish recipe. To be continued next week …