Growing the Unusual Tomatillo Plant

With spring around the corner, it will soon be time to think about planting in your garden. This year, add something new and different and plant a tomatillo, removing the regular tomatoes. This plant looks like a normal tomato plant and is like a tomato, but the similarity ends there. Instead of a large ball of red or yellow fruit, the tomatillo fruit is small, round, pod-covered and about one-half to three-quarters of an inch in diameter.

The tomatillo is a relatively new plant to gardens in the United States. It is an annual, upright, leafy (and sometimes woody) shrub in the nightshade family. Mainly grown in Mexico and Guatemala and in most part of California, in many dishes it is commonly called Mexican or Latin cuisine. For sauce, salsa, stew, soup, and as a sauce for rice. It can be fried or made into a dessert sauce, jam, or marmalade. It can also be eaten raw right from the bush.

Seeds should be started about six weeks before the last anticipated frost and planted at an eighth of a height. After six weeks, the plants should be hardened off for an extra week in a day and planted when the ground is warm. Plants should be 18-24 inches without rows 3-4 feet. They need also a lot of sun, so don’t choose an area that receives too much shade. trees. They require a lot of water, and mulching around the plants is useful to help retain moisture in the soil. to grow in any soil suitable for tomatoes but not soaking in wet conditions. Fertilizer containing nitrogen and phosphorus can be added as care for the plant.

The tomatillo, sometimes called the earth cherry or pod tomato, grows about 3-4 meters tall. The plant cage in the tomato cage should be committed to reduce the fruit from the ground to fruit prey. The growing period is between 70 and 90 days, depending on the variety of seeds purchased and they can be green, yellow, purple in color. The fruit is ripe when the pod turns brown and begins to split. Once picked, the pods must be removed and the fruit will last up to two weeks refrigerated and can also be frozen. Each plant can produce between 60 to 200 fruits or about two pounds per plant in a season

Some people like to use the tomatillo ornamental plant first; if, however, it is to be used as an ornament, the fruit must still be taken. Use a large planter and make plant water enough. It is a good idea to use two or three plants for tomatillo to produce fruit for cross pollination.

For those who want to try tomatillo without eating it, it can be purchased in many stores or can be found canned in ethnic food. they can