Dreaming of tomatoes

Jeanne Crisp and Julie Kelly

According to journalist and gardener Erica Grivas, Seattle is "One tough tomato town. It's not impossible, for sure, but oh it takes guts."

Marina is the treasurer for the Mukilteo Community Garden, and she is becoming our tomato expert. She thinks of tomatoes as "my soul focus in the garden, my main source of pleasure and anguish, but also lots and lots of tomato sandwiches."

In past years Marina grew tomatoes in her p-patch garden and later in patio pots. The results were disappointing. The tomatoes planted in the ground took up lots of real estate but yielded relatively few tomatoes. The patio pots were a little better, but she wanted more than a few pounds of tomatoes from three plants.

Then she had the genius idea to grow as many tomatoes in the garden bed as she could fit – vertically. Vertical tomato growing means staking plants so they grow upright, leaving two or three productive branches per plant and trimming off the rest.

In 2021 Marina went into research mode, selecting heirloom tomato seeds suitable for the Pacific Northwest and reading every book about tomatoes in the library. Because heirloom tomatoes are open pollinators, multiple varieties can be grown next to each other. She ended up trying 13 varieties last summer.

Her heroes became tomato people. She read about Tom Wagner, tomato breeder from Everett, who introduced the Green Zebra variety. And Tim Stark with his memoirs of accidental tomato grower – an excellent read. She even bought her own copy of Stark's book so she can someday stalk him at his Pennsylvania farm stand.

Seeds were planted the last week of March. She used a greenhouse, with heat mats under the trays and lights above. After about four weeks, the plants were large enough to pot up to four-inch containers. In mid-May, it was time to start "hardening off" the seedlings, which meant slowly acclimating them to outdoor temperatures, but bringing them back into the greenhouse during cold evenings.

When soil and air temperatures started to warm up, after Memorial Day, the tomatoes could be planted. In addition to Marina's own 8 by 8 bed, three food bank beds were devoted to her experiment. She immediately put stakes next to each one to help keep them tied up as they grew. And as a bonus for the food bank, basil, a good companion plant to tomatoes, was planted throughout those beds as well.

Last summer's intense heat was unwelcome to many, but the tomato plants loved it. Regular watering ensured healthy plants, and the yield was very rewarding. All together, Marina grew 38 plants and harvested 350 pounds, most of which went to food banks in Mukilteo and Lynnwood, to the delight of local food bank customers.

The tomatoes Marina grows are started from seeds she selects and orders online from different tomato growers. Last year her focus was tomatoes that would do well in a cooler climate and would mature mid-season. This year she's going to try the Green Zebra mentioned above, as well as other midseason tomatoes grown for slicing.

There are too many varieties to enumerate here, but Marina does have a favorite: "Jaune Flamme was the first tomato I ever grew. I obviously bought it for the sexy name ("flame yellow") and it didn't disappoint. I've loved the pretty orange medium, perfectly round and tasty fruit, and hope to keep it on rotation for years to come."

Other favorites include Azoychka, a yellow medium beefsteak that's early to ripen, Paul Robeson, a medium brown tomato with a complex sweet and smoky flavor, and Bull's Heart, a large heart-shaped pink fruit with excellent sweet flavor.

When asked why she is so crazy about tomatoes, Marina explained: "There is almost nothing that beats a hearty tomato sandwich on a tasty slice of grande boule bread, or a caprese salad with mozzarella, the good kind, and freshly picked basil, or for the adventurous kind, the tomato base bortsch as my family makes it, or even cold gazpacho soup. It does take the perfect tomato fruit, though, to achieve those gastro wonders."

At the end of the 2021 season, Marina pondered: "As any farmer and determined gardener would attest, October is the season for gardening fatigue. I'm dreading the Post Tomato Stress Disorder, as Tim Stark calls it. Was it worth it? Am I doing this again? Should I just quit, move into a high-rise and only look at vegetables on Instagram? I could, but I won't."

Marina's 2022 tomato season is in full swing, with seedlings almost ready to pot up. Visit the Mukilteo Community Garden later this summer for a look at the latest batch of tomato dreams. To schedule a tour and meet Marina, send a message to p-patch@mukilteogarden.org.