The best way to ripen green tomatoes
Comments(29)
Danny loves guzzling our ripe tomatoes straight from the vine. This is partly why I grow them. It’s great to see my tomatoes savoured and relished. Now the evenings are drawing in, I often see him out with a torch when I swing in from work, searching to see if any have ripened in the autumn sunshine. The ripening process is slow at this stage of the season.
We have managed to keep the tomato blight at bay by removing blighty leaves, stalks and fruit as soon as they appear. This has to be done daily and the blighty bits burnt. We haven’t used any sprays this summer so each tomato that Danny pops in his mouth is 100% organic. When the blight was at its height I mentioned the grisly spray word, to be met with a loud negative rejoinder.
Unfortunately, Danny didn’t twig that the vines at the front of the house needed to be watered when I was ill in bed recently. Too much or too little water can split the tomatoes. So we have a good crop of split, which need a day or two of warm sun before they are transmogrified into our rich tomato sauce. We make gallons of the stuff and this generally sees us through until the spring.
This weekend I had planned to move all the non split green tomatoes to the greenhouse to ripen. A small foray onto the internet told me otherwise. Here are a few expert tips that will allow your green tomatoes to ripen well.
Some people remove the leaves from the vines and hang the vines in a cool garage or shed to ripen. I am going to ripen our green tomatoes in the house. I used to ripen them on the windowsills but I have discovered that direct sunlight hardens the skins and there is a much better way to ripen them indoors.
Pick ripe, nearly ripe and mature green fruits before the possibility of frost. Remove long stems to prevent them from piercing each other. Store tomatoes in cardboard or wooden boxes, 1 to 2 layers deep, in a cool moderately humid room. Cover the boxes with newspaper as tomatoes need darkness to ripen.. Check the toms every day and remove the ripe ones.
As tomatoes ripen, they naturally release ethylene gas, which stimulates ripening. To speed up the ripening process put a ripening tomato, apple or banana in the box with green tomatoes. To slow the ripening process and give yourself an extended harvest store some tomatoes, covered in cardboard boxes, in a cooler location.
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I often put unripe toms in a basket, and check them daily, because they ripen from the middle. Or, if I want them quickly, put them in a kitchen drawer. All this because I noticed that on the vine they tend to ripen from the darkest spots nearest the stem.
How wonderful to have such a good crop of tomatoes this year – a lot of hard work, which I didn’t manage to put in, so our crop is commensurately small.
Joanna x
another way for a quick ripe is to place tomatoes in a brown paper bag with a banana, works well
Hi Joanna,
We harvested 10 kilos! So will be able to experiment with loads of different ways to ripen them!
Hi Nick,
Thanks for the tip.
Hi Nick and Joanna.
I know the general ideal is to ripen the tomatoe until red ,but these are little green treasures right now, I would take advantage of your stock and consider making a green tomatoe and onion chutney with cumin seeds and chilli, Imagine what a fine Boxing day treat it would make with cold cuts or a Melton mowbray pork pie. I have a great recipe if you need it……
Hi Mark,
I think I might try a green tomato chutney this year as we have so many! I tried and tested recipe is always worth sharing. Thanks.
I picked my green tomatoes and did what everybody stated using newspaper. But my tomatoes have gone mouldy and brown. Where have I gone wrong? Is it because I used the Sun newspaper?
Hi Denise,
We had tomatoes in slightly blighted plants and toms on healthy plants. The ones from the blighted plants have been stored separately and most have gone mouldy and brown. The rest are fine.
Was it page three of the Sun?
Thanks for the reply. The tomato plants were fine, apart from when we were flooded. They seemed to recover from this. It was the courgettes that ended up with mouldy leaves, the vegetables tasted fine.
Hi Denise,
If the plants were healthy, I have no idea what caused the toms to rot. Perhaps someone out there knows the answer.
I hope so because I was very proud of my tomatoes. I have thrown about a stone of them away and I am heartbroken after using the security light to tend to them.!!! Another matter is my strawbs are now very fruitful even though I have cut off the flowers. Don’t suppose these will ripen either. I hope I have more luck next year
Hi Denise,
Another cause of rot is Blossom End Rot. This is caused by too little or too much water. This generally hits in the summer.
Do you have a greenhouse? If so, why not shift your strawberries into the greenhouse and see what happens? You are probably too late for any great action.
Hi,
I put some green tomatoes in a plastic container inside a cardboard box with a banana next to them, some with branches on, and some without. About five days later they had fluffy mould growing on them, and had gone brown on the bottom. I’m not sure what I did wrong. Any suggestions?
I’m no expert but the plastic container might have had something to do with it – not allowing any moisture to evaporate properly?
Hi Mark, would love to try your recipe for tomato and onion chutney with cumin and chilli, if you could send it to to me that would be great. Many thanks. Fran.
Hi Fran
I’d love this recipe too.
hi can i have the green onion chutney recipie too
Loving the site, have made sloe gin, blackberry vodka ,please may i have the chutney recipe so I dont look too much like a lush. thanks.
Please may I have a copy of the chutney recipe too.
Hi Fran, Sarra, and Jano
I’ve emailed Mark so hopefully he will send the recipe.
I too am having problems with my tomatoes, I have a lovely crop, no splits or anything yet they won’t ripen at all, I have tried ripening them with a banana, that did not work, any tips appreciated, thanks.
I would not mind any recipes where green tomatoes can be used, such as chutney.
Thankyou
Hi Josephine
I only discovered this year that tomatoes need heat to ripen as well as sunshine. I’ve put mine on a sunny windowsill (indoors)and they are ripening slowly.
There’s a good recipe here for green tomatoes
http://www.cottagesmallholder.com/rozanne-halls-green-tomato-mince-filling-and-crumb-topping-recipes-482
I have ripened green tomatoes for years by wrapping each tomato in a 1/2 sheet of newspaper, placing them, single layer, in a box and sliding them under my bed (the coolest room in the house). We have had fresh tomatoes at Thanskgiving and sometimes even for Christmas.
You must check them at least twice a week and remove any that are softening, without ripening.
What month of the year do you give up for the tomatoes to ripen on the vine, before you start to think of other things to do??
Hi there all, can anyone help me to identify the ‘appendeges’ (don’t laugh)growing on my potatoes? I’ve grown potatoes before,yet haven’t encountered this before.
They look as if they have grown tomato trusses from the top of the plant where the flowers have dropped off, they actually smell like tomatoes on the vine but are hard and green(aliens), well they are to me, these are on quite a few of my potato crops, what are they, can anyone tell me what these are and why they’ve grown?…………
Had a great crop of beetroot, spring onions, tumbling toms,until that dreadful wind blew everything to pieces, toms have more micropore holding the friut laden branches together than I’ve ever used in a life-time!
Poor toms, there, there, no I didn’t kiss them better although I felt rather upset at all my dedicated hard work being damaged.
Green house next year if finances allow.(which I doubt) never mind,will try all over again next year.
Mant thanks, any answers to my potato fruit would be welcome.
Hope to hear from you soon,
Odelle.
Hi Odelle
Bad luck with the tomatoes, what a shame
Re: Your spuds. These are “fruit” but beware – they are poisonous. I’ve seen them in another garden and when I inquired was told that they are the sign of a happy potato plant.
can you please send me your recipe for green tomato chutney, my email address was wrong in the last query
I’m sorry Jacqui but I don’r have a recipe for green tomato chutney – maybe I’ll create one this year.
Good Morning Fiona,
Had to tell you, my ‘Happy Potato Plants’ well one of them so far have left me delighted, we unearthed some beautiful,huge, perfect spuds! Guess what were eating tonight? Our own potatoes, salad, tomatoes, beetroot (bumper crop) and spring onions, oh, coleslaw with our own onions and carrots.
Oh how different food tastes when home-grown, how rewarding and satisfying to know that it’s all our own with no ‘nasties’ been used on it.
Homemade ‘brown bread’,your recipie using spelt flour, dessert bramble pie, brambles fron my good friend and neighbour in return for some pies and our produce.
They’re calling us ‘Barbara n Tom’, from the Good Life!
Many thanks to you Fiona, want to try ‘farmhouse cake’, however can’t seem to find it, next to try is the slow cook belly of pork, sounds delicious.
Shall let you know how the spuds taste!
With much gratitude,
Odelle. (oooh how I love this website, ever so pleased that I found you!)
would like the recipe for green tomato chutney with onions…Thanks Irene