The holidays have passed, time to start planning for next year’s garden! But before we do that, time to analyze how last year’s garden went.

Last year was my first year to have a full, real garden and not a tiny container garden on an apartment patio. We bought our house in May 2020 and moved in at the end of May, smack dab in the middle of prime planting season. Luckily we knew the previous owners (my parents) and I was able to get in mid-May to get some of my seedings planted (tomatoes, mostly). But in general, with the move, most everything got started at least a month later than I would have liked. Still, I was gung ho to plant pretty much anything i could get my hands on. And so I did.

I have a lot of food restrictions due to various food intolerances and sensitivities. Tomatoes, peppers (both sweet and hot), citrus, mints, kiwis, and pineapples are all not great for me, sadly. But each year I’ll be trying try a few different types of tomatoes until I find a good sauce tomato, and I’ll grow a few peppers mainly because they grow well in my climate and look pretty.

Garden 2020: Tomatoes and Peppers

Tomatoes: This past year, I was determined that if I was going to grow food I really shouldn’t be eating, it would be the best type of that species that I could grow. So I did a bit of research and landed on San Marzano tomatoes (seeds, misc Amazon sellers). This is an heirloom Roma-type tomato that is supposedly highly prized by chefs. I started the seeds for these in April 2020 and planted them early June 2020. Out of the 20-30 seeds I planted, I got about 10 strong seedlings, and kept 8 of them. They were moderately productive through the season, and then decided to put out a ton of green fruit in mid Sept. I harvested all of the green ones that I could and finished ripening them in paper bags, and end up with about half of my San Marzanos being vine-ripened and half being paper-bag ripened.

I also lost least half of my total crop to blossom end-rot–apparently this is the bane of Roma-type tomatoes. I did end up making a small amount of sauce from them, which I haven’t tasted yet. However, given their small size (a lot of work for a small amount of tomato pulp per tomato) and their propensity for end-rot, I don’t plan on growing them next year.

I also grow a Yellow Brandywine tomato plant (seeds, Baker Creek), as I was hoping that a mild yellow tomato wouldn’t trigger my acid-reflux reaction as badly. The plant grew very slowly, had bad germination (hence only 1 plant), and only produced 1 tomato. It was a big, beautiful Brandywine-style tomato, and tasted juicy and amazing, but I’ve come to find it’s not the type of tomato but whether it is fresh or not that triggers the acid reflux. I can somewhat get away with small amounts of cooked tomatoes, but not fresh ones 😦 So, another no-go for next year’s garden.

Peppers: I eat peppers even less than I eat tomatoes, but I wanted to try something new, so this year I grew Sugar Rush Peach Peppers (seeds, Baker Creek). I started them at the same time as the tomato seeds but then took considerably longer to germinate. I even had some seedings sprout two months after planting them, after I had already given up on them and reused the potting mix. All in all, I got three plants out of the 10 or so seeds I planted, and one of them was able to reach to full maturity before the end of summer and produce a ton of peppers. These are extremely hot peppers, and I made the mistake of harvesting and chopping a bunch of them without gloves on. I see now why Mace is a legitimate weapon–pepper juice is painful! I haven’t decided if I’ll grow this one again next year. The flavor is a very nice spicy-sweet, but I would only use two or three peppers in my cooking, total.

A friend gave me a Lilac Bell Pepper seedling to grow. It grew well and produced much fruit despite never growing very large (possibly the pot it was in was too small.) As I’m not an eater of bell peppers, I ended up giving most of them away 🙂

I also gave in and grabbed a bunch of pepper plants mid-summer from various big box stores. I ended up with poblanos, jalapeños, and banana peppers. They grew well, but after tasting each of them, I found that the poblano and banana peppers were mild but tasted just like green bell peppers (which I despise), and the jalapeño was too spicy and also tasted like raw green bell pepper. Ugh. So, not planning on growing any of those unless a friend or family member wants me to. (My fiancé Erik likes spicy food, but doesn’t regularly cook with peppers.)

Next year’s tomatoes and peppers: I’m going to stay away from Romas, despite them theoretically being the best sauce tomato. Instead I’m thinking of trying a Paul Robeson (Baker Creek) or Carbon (Baker Creek) or Bonnie’s Best (MIGardener), or an Italian Heirloom, if I can get ahold of the seeds from somebody. As for peppers, I’m still up in the air and haven’t bought any new pepper seeds yet. It’ll likely be something more ornamental than edible.