Wednesday, August 17, 2005

We built a raised garden bed this year to keep Oscar from eating the carrots and cherry tomatoes. It worked... he has trouble getting up into the veggies now. But then our tomato plants got so heavy they bent and hung over the edge of the bed to the ground. Oscar could trot right up to the plants and help himself.

So we put a little fence around them and we have found him stuck in there five times, tomato seeds stuck to his face.

As a result the cherry tomato crop this year is lacking, but our beefsteak tomatoes look plentiful. Dinner has been consisting of BLT's and fresh pasta sauce. As soon as I get more than two at a time, I want to make salsa. There are also some good recipes here... I think a tomato tart is in my near future.

15 comments:

  1. We don't eat a lot of tomatoes at my house. Hubby hates them, but I love a good tomatoe and cucumber salad. Annie's makes a great Shitake Mushroom dressing that is perfect on them. Kraft's green goddess is great too.

    PS. Have you seen the Discover Cards with a pug on them?? They're darling. I wanted one of a golden retriever when we had May, but she was old and didn't look like the young pup on the card, so we got a One-Of-A-Card with her actual picture on it from first national. It's so darling!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sorry but I had to check out what salsa recipe you would use and NO! Don't follow that! I grew up in south Texas and watched my grandmother make homemade tortillas, chorizo and of course salsa.
    get your tomotoes, CILANTRO and blend them up in your blender- once it is all mixed add half of a white onion, jalapenos (I use 4-5 but I like my salsa spicy) squeeze the juice of an entire lemon into the mix and add 23 shakes of garlic salt. Blend some more and serve with chips. Unfortunately I cannot really give you amounts because it has always been by taste. I love cilantro so I add as much as I feel is needed. The 23 shakes of garlic salt is one of my grandmother's mexican superstitions. Hope you try it. All of my friends love this salsa and I have also exchanged the tomatoes for tomatillos to make tomatillo salsa. Good luck!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Look at Oscar's guilty little face! Priceless :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. mm thanks for posting that link to recipes. theres nothing i love more than fresh summer tomatoes. your garden is doing soooo well!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Those recipes ROCK but it doesn't look like I'm going to get the tomato bounty I got last year - though I could be remembering the dates wrong.

    Adapting that basil crust to this parmesan crust could prove D. Lightful:
    http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/000283.html

    ReplyDelete
  6. A tomato eating pug!

    Too funny.

    Little seeds stuck to his face.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Hey, we have the same orange thingy. Mylo loves going into the garden too but he favors mints for some reason...hmmm.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I agree w/ Christina. Tomatoes, onion, cilantro, garlic, jalapeno and lime is all you need for really killer salsa. I'm not the biggest fan of cilantro so I just use the leaves. For a stronger flavor use the stems too.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I am one of those people that cilantro tastes like soap. I don't know why it's like that... body chemistry? What can I use instead?

    ReplyDelete
  10. Matilda, the pug, can't get enough of our cherry tomatoes too... but she's not smart enough to pick her own, she peruses the bottom looking for fallen ones. She finally figured out how to get through our garden fence so next year we're gonna try the raised garden too.

    -beth

    ReplyDelete
  11. Gizmo and Gadget can't get anywhere near my rooftop garden, so i don't have to worry about that -- but i still wonder -- they've never tried tomatoes, i bet they'd like them!

    ReplyDelete
  12. I'm one of the "cilantro tastes like soap" people too. Well, actually, I oscillate between "soap" and "tires", but it's definitely never a good taste. And I can't even handle putting even a tiny bit in salsa. So when I make salsa, I put parsley in it instead. Anyone who likes cilantro will hate it and think it's not nearly as good, but all the other cilantro-haters of the world will gobble it up. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  13. use parsley instead. my parent's cocker eats cherry tomatoes off the vine and only picks the ripe ones and doesn't break the vine!

    ReplyDelete
  14. Wanna trade tomatoes? I have little grapes coming out my ears (despite my corgi/pug's scavenging), but hardly any good beefsteaks.

    ReplyDelete
  15. My two dogs are pug chow mix and this past weekend they stole home grown tomatos that were ripening on the kitchen table in the middle of the night and ate them on the bed without us even waking up!

    Silly tomato eating dogs!

    ReplyDelete