Loteria Grill Was Fun!

Friday's harvest includes 19 Black Cherry, 11 Snow White, 10 Sweet 100, 9 SunGold(2), 4 Husky Cherry Red, 3 Jersey Giant, 3 Juliet, 2 Porkchop, 2 Isis Candy, 2 Husky Red(1), 2 Supersweet 100, 2 Piement, 2 "Something Orange" (14 ounces, 14.5 ounces) 2 Green Grape, Vorlon, Shah/Mikado, SunGold(1), Jaune Flamme, Blue Beauty, Amos Coli, Cuor de Bue (7 ounces), "Rosella Purple" (Aunt Ruby's German Green, 6 ounces) and Clint Eastwood's Rowdy Red(2) for a total of 82 tomatoes.

We've now harvested over 100 Snow White tomatoes today (104).

Saturday's harvest includes 24 Black Cherry, 14 Sweet 100, 7 Snow White, 7 Supersweet 100, 3 Cuor de Bue (9 ounces, 7 ounces), 3 Juliet, 2 Shah/Mikado, 2 Green Grape, 2 Blue Beauty, 2 Jaune Flamme, Dr. Wyche's Yellow (17.5 ounces), Black and Brown Boar, SunGold(1), SunGold(2), Vorlon, Indigo Rose, Pineapple Pig (7 ounces), Piement, Aunt Ruby's German Green, "Rosella Purple" (Aunt Ruby's German Green, 7 ounces), Clint Eastwood's Rowdy Red(2) and Husky Red(1) for a total of 78 tomatoes.

After the harvest, my wife and I quickly got ready for the Tomatomania event at the Loteria Grill. We brought all our Piement and all our Black Cherry tomatoes, most of our Aunt Ruby's German Green and Cuor de Bue tomatoes and today's Dr. Wyche's Yellow for tasting. Based on the comments I overheard, people really liked our tomatoes.

My wife and I ended up as part of Scott Daigre's "groupie" crowd after the taste testing. My wife and I came late -- by the time we showed up Scott was talking and all the tables were taken. During the taste testing we tried to sit down at a half open table but we got booted out. So we tried an open booth in a corner -- it wasn't open during the Scott's talk -- and the "groupies" gathered around after about 10 minutes. Works for me.

The "groupie" table agreed that Shah/Mikado was rather blah. But there were many new varieties that were quite interesting. We all caught up with what's happening in our lives and so on, the meals were great (even better than prior years, IMO) and a good time was had by all. We came away with Lemon Tree and Blue Beauty tomatoes as well as some of Scott's fresh eggs. It was really nice!

Oh yeah, we broke the 2500 harvest number today for 2013 (2532). Also, we harvested over 200 Sweet 100 tomatoes this year (209)!

Sunday's harvest includes 18 Black Cherry, 8 Sweet 100, 7 Supersweet 100, 6 Snow White, 5 Juliet, 3 Porkchop, 3 Husky Red(2), 2 Jersey Giant, 2 "Rosella Purple" (Aunt Ruby's German Green), 2 Blue Beauty, 2 Shah/Mikado, 2 Cuor de Bue (8 ounces, 8 ounces), 2 Clint Eastwood's Rowdy Red(2) (6 ounces, 6 ounces), 2 Isis Candy, 2 Husky Cherry Red, 2 Yellow Perfection, Vorlon, Black Krim, Missouri Pink Love Apple, SunGold(1), SunGold(2) and Piement for a total of 74 tomatoes.

My wife pulled Black Krim today.

We've now harvested over 400 Black Cherry tomatoes this year (417)!

My wife prepared some of Scott's eggs this morning as well as cutting up a Clint Eastwood's Rowdy Red(2) for me. The eggs were great and the Clint Eastwood's Rowdy Red(2) was quite good. I'd call it good tasting and refreshing.

However, there was no harvest today due to back trouble. Let's hope it clears up enough for me to harvest tomorrow 

Fun At The Loteria Grill!

Today's harvest included 25 Black Cherry, 13 Super Snow White, 13 Snow White, 11 Babywine, 11 Red Currant, 6 White Zebra (one 6 ounces), 5 back yard Husky Cherry Red, 5 Jaune Coeur de Pigeon, 4 Japanese Black Trifele, 3 Husky Gold, 3 White Currant, 3 back yard Garden Peach(2), 2 Berkeley Tie Dye (6 ounces, 7.5 ounces), 2 Green Zebra(2), 2 Plum Tigris, 2 Sweet 100, 2 Red Grape, 2 SunSugar, 2 Jaune Flamme, 2 Oaxacan Jewel(2), 2 front yard Husky Cherry Red, Mong, Silvery Fir Tree, a front yard Garden Peach, Amazon Chocolate (6 ounces), Paul Robeson and Italian Ice for a total of 126 tomatoes.

I got up early to harvest. No time to blog or put in the figures. I got my wife up and we got ready to head to the Loteria Grill for a morning tomato tasting. We had this event last year and it was a lot of fun.

We brought along 3 White Zebras, a handful of Black Cherries, 4 Japanese Black Trifeles and 2 Mexico tomatoes for the tomato tasting. We rushed to the event, getting there about 8:40 AM and helped prepare the event for the 10 AM tasting.

The event was just as fun as ever though I remember even more tomato varieties this year. We liked Old German, Toni's Round and Green Giant.

The story of who brought in Green Giant is interesting. I am a software developer by trade, and growing tomatoes is a fun hobby. Two years ago one of my best friends (the best man at my wedding) and I went in to visit a guy who needed an upgrade of their old data entry system. I did a little work on their system only to realize I had none of their data files. I can't run it. There was some correspondence between my friend and this person...but nothing happened and it faded away.

You should know where this is leading. My wife pulled out the tomato of a sack and handed it to me and I did what I do to prepare it. My wife pulled out a card that said “Green Giant”, turned it over and hey, that's the business card from the two year old potential client! My wife pointed him out...hey, that's him!

So we talked to him for a while. He's a pleasant guy, fun to talk to. He says he still wants to upgrade his system but also said he was gravely concerned about losing his business late last year. I don't hold out much hope to upgrade to their data entry system but talk about serendipity...

I tested our Mexico tomato and it was pretty good. I tried the Japanese Black Trifele and the taste was excellent. The Black Cherry and White Zebra were all gone so I don't know how they tasted.

A group of us went to Umami Burger after the event to discuss the tasting and possible future events.

We got home and immediately took a nap.