What to Do with 10 Pounds of Green Tomatoes

This past spring, my boyfriend and I planted a tomato plant in the front yard. We don't know the first thing about gardening. The plant was so small and adorable when we bought it at Home Depot, so we just planted it in a landscaped area in our front yard next to a few patches of monkey grass and some sticker bushes.

I was amazed this summer when the plant started to grow. It produced three whole red tomatoes! That's more produce than I've ever grown before. But then the plant turned kinda yellow, and I was pretty sure it was dying. I never water my plants. It's just not a priority for me, and when they die, I just shrug it off. But for some reason, I didn't want to see this tomato plant die, so I started watering it regularly, along with the habanero plant we planted beside it.

By September, the tomato plant still wasn't doing anything. No more tomatoes. And then suddenly, out of nowhere, it just started growing. It got so big that it outgrew it's stake and turned into a giant tentacled tomato monster, producing green tomatoes like crazy. But as the weather turned colder in early November, I knew the green tomatoes didn't stand a chance at turning red. So I harvested them, all 10 pounds of 'em.

Now, I love me some fried green tomatoes, but 10 pounds?! That's too many tomatoes to fry. So I decided to make Green Tomato Chutney!

I used this recipe from Shockingly Delicious. Diced green tomatoes are cooked down with golden raisins, brown sugar, allspice, ginger, onion, black pepper, and apple cider vinegar. I canned nine jars of this stuff! A few of my friends will definitely be getting jars for Christmas, but I'm keeping a few for myself.

I cracked open my first jar last week for an unconventional Indian breakfast — Onion Paranthas with Green Tomato Chutney:

The onion parantha recipe came from Happy Face Vegan. I've made them before, so I knew these onion-stuffed flatbreads would be perfect for topping with the savory-sweet chutney. Each day last week at breakfast, I had a couple of paranthas with chutney and a slice of veggie bacon.

Sure, it would have been nice to get more red tomatoes from the plant. But I'm really just happy I managed to grow anything at all. Maybe I'll even try again next year.