Backyard Bounty

Yes, I’m a dummkopf. I knew when I planted the oh-so-cute little Brandywine/Maxifort plant that I grafted this spring on the side of the greenhouse that it was a bad idea. But I thought I’d be able to contain it. Call it springtime optimism. Now I have to crawl underneath it – just like snaking through the raspberry brambles growing up back in Ohio – to harvest the basil, peppers or artichoke. It’s a monster. I’m afraid to have the  boys too close for fear that it’ll grab them. The good news is it’s producing.

I grafted the Brandywine heirloom onto the super vigorous growing Maxifort hybrid to promote production. Brandywines were developed in the late 1800s by the Amish back in Ohio so they thrive in those hot, humid nights and long summers. Out here we have typically cool nights (tonight’s forecast is 43 degrees) and an abbreviated season. Many years the Brandywines don’t ripen at all. We started picking ripe Brandywines weeks ago so obviously the grafting remedied the situation. Now I just need to be smarter about the containment!

The Stupice have been coming on strong for weeks, as well. I love them because they’re the solid grower no matter how crappy (and that is the proper adjective for what we had) the weather is during the spring and summer. As usual, they don’t disappoint. They’ve been ripening enough at a time to serve them for dinner, and today I used them in a soup recipe.

Soon I think we’ll be tossing the chocolate cherry tomatoes over the neighbor’s fence just to do something with them. Not really – I have plenty of friends who will love them – but the enormous plant is loaded. I don’t think my tomatoes have ever looked this good, which floors me since we had such a wretched spring. If the warm weather can hold on for another month (or more!) we’ll be in mater heaven for the rest of the winter.

Tags: Brandywine, heirloom, Maxifort hybrid, tomatoes