Green tomatoes

Welsh_Totster

Hello folks. I've got 6 outdoor cherry tomato plants which are looking worse for wear now, laden with vines full of cherry tomatoes which are rather green. I've managed to pick a handfull that have ripened on the vine (and eaten them too, sooo tasty!) however, the slugs and snails are starting to move in on the plants and the plants themselves are looking like they're on their last legs. So my question is, is it worth me snipping off the bunches of cherry tomatoes now and try and ripen them indoors?.... or do I have to wait longer to see if they'll ripen on the plants? I don't want to waste any if I can help it and they are lovely tasty little fruits too. Any ideas mucho appreciated, ta!

Ash_McCloud

Taken from this website

If you still have green tomatoes well into the cool days of fall, you can lift the entire plant and hang it in a dry, sheltered location, like the garage. The fruits will continue to ripen and will still have some of the benefits of ripening on the vine. Try and take some roots with the plant, but you can shake off any soil. You don’t want to hang the plants in direct sunlight or total darkness.


You can also go the old tried and true route of picking the more mature green fruits and ripening them in the house. These will have a tinge of color at the blossom end and feel a little softer than the solid young fruits. Options for ripening green tomatoes indoors include:

Placing them on a sunny window sill. This is a hit or miss solution. You’ll have much better luck ripening mature green tomatoes. Although the tomatoes are more stable sitting on their stem side, they will rot less readily if you can place them blossom side down.
Wrapping individual green tomatoes in newspaper and layering in a box, no more than 2 layers deep. Place the box in a dark, dry spot and check weekly for progress. It usually takes 3-4 weeks for the tomatoes to ripen, but check frequently and remove any fruits that show signs of rotting.
Placing the green tomatoes in a paper bag with a ripe apple. The apple gives off ethylene gas, which speeds up ripening. Check the bag daily.


And finally, you can always eat your green tomatoes.
Green Tomato Soup With Country Ham
Green Tomato Marmalade Recipe
Green Tomato, Apple and Grape Relish
Green Tomato Cake
Fried Green Tomatoes

adamg02

Good tips there thanks.. just to add, I was over at spitalfields city farm last week and most if not all of the outdoor tomato plants had all the leaves cut off, just leaving the fruit to get all the energy and ripen up.

any experience of this (i'm only in 2nd year tomato growing, but might test it on plant now), think it works?

wallbash

any experience of this (i'm only in 2nd year tomato growing, but might test it on plant now), think it works?

Standard practice. Strip of nearly all the leaves .

But I have a little more patience , my toms stay on the plants for a little while longer. we may well get some warm bright days still.

Welsh_Totster

Thanks everyone, there's plenty to think about there......never thought of stripping the leaves to let the fruits ripen......!