Tag Archives: storing-tomatoes

Tomatoes Wintered Over

I pulled all my green tomatoes in Mid October right before it frosted real hard. I put them in a box wrapped in newspaper and put them in the basement. I have done this for several years now and this method works pretty good for preserving and saving the green tomatoes for use later.

This photo is of a few of my tomatoes that I am still pulling out of the box this week for use. Some are a bit wrinkled but they sure taste much better than those store-bought plastic tasting tomatoes that you get at the store this time of year.

A few tips if you try this wintering over idea. Check the tomatoes frequently to remove any overripe or spoiling tomatoes from your storage box or bag. I normally just cut off the bad part if any and use the remaining tomato in making sauces or condiments. Also make sure you keep the box or bag in a cool, dry and dark basement or area for storage. I found this works best. This year I used long, low boxes which I found worked out very well for the tomatoes to be stored. If you stack tomatoes on top of each other they tend to spoil faster in my opinion. Use newspaper to wrap them separately as this helps extend the wintering over process.

It truly is enjoyable to eat my own fresh tomatoes in January from last year’s garden. I plan to expand on this wintered over tomato idea again this year.

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Ripening Green Tomatoes

As my gardening season comes to an end, I still have many green tomatoes on my plants. Here is just a small bag of green tomatoes I harvested off of two plants. I needed to harvest the tomatoes on these plants as they were in frost danger. You can always cover your tomato plants at night to protect them from frost but the end of my warm season is here and it was time to just pick the green tomatoes.
Harvested Green Tomatoes

I wrote a post a few years ago with a great tip on ripening green tomatoes. You can read that post here. If you don’t have a ripe banana to place inside your brown paper bag, don’t worry. The green tomatoes will ripen over time inside a closed brown paper bag. You can also wrap the green tomatoes in newspaper and then place them inside the paper bag. This is another good way to ripen green tomatoes and store them for future use. You can read more about storing green tomatoes here.

If nothing else, place the green tomatoes on a sunny, inside window ledge and they will also ripen over time. But if you have lots of green tomatoes, you might try my useful idea about storage of the tomatoes. It is very nice to have red home-grown tomatoes into November from the brown bag storage idea.

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Green Tomatoes Stored 5 Months

Last fall I had lots of green tomatoes and set out to save them again as I did last year. I just wanted to share the results after 5 months in storage. These are the last of my green tomatoes from last October.

Here is the blog post I wrote about storing tomatoes in newspaper for fall and winter use. This method not only stores the tomatoes but also allows them to ripen over time. Just check the tomatoes periodically and use them as needed.

As you can see the tomatoes are red and still very usable. I cut a few up this morning and cooked them Continue Reading →

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Storing Tomatoes in Newspaper

At the end of the gardening season last year I had many green tomatoes. I wrapped them in pieces of newspaper and stored them in a brown paper bag in my basement. I kept them in the dark and they not only ripened over the winter but stored very well.

Here are a few of the last tomatoes that I just unwrapped today. They have been stored in the newspaper for 4 months. As you can see they look pretty good. Some of the skins are a bit wrinkled but these tomatoes tasted great in my green salad today.

Storing Details:
Wrap only about 2 green tomatoes in each piece of newspaper loosely. Place each wrapped newspaper bundle in a brown paper bag. I was able to put quite a few bundles of wrapped tomatoes in the paper bag. Close the bag and keep it in the dark. Storing in the basement worked well for me.

Check the tomatoes in a few weeks or as needed. Remove the red ripened tomatoes. Re-wrap the green tomatoes and put them back into the brown paper bag until ripe or when you need a tomato.

Conclusion:
Green tomatoes can be saved, stored, and ripened over the winter for future use.

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Storing Green Tomatoes

I had many green tomatoes left over after the gardening season. I just hated not saving them for future use. I had read that you can store green tomatoes for future use by wrapping them individually in newspaper. So I gathered all my green tomatoes in October and wrapped them separately in pieces of newspaper. I then put them loosely in a brown paper bag and put them in my basement larder.

Today I carefully unwrapped a few of the newspapers to check on the tomatoes. I needed a few tomatoes for a green salad I wanted to make. I was pleasantly surprised that many of the tomatoes were bright red and ripe. A few were still green or orange so I just re-wrapped them and put them back in the bag to use later.

So if you have green tomatoes, you might want to try out this useful idea for storing and ripening your tomatoes. Using this method will provide you ripe tasty tomatoes well into the winter months.

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