I’m not longer staring at my garden like a pot ready to boil, muttering “bloom, bloom, bloom, bloom.” My six or seven tomato plants are erupting in cherry tomatoes, heirloom tomatoes and good stuff of all sorts. I can’t wait until they start to turn red more than three or four at a time.
And you know, that’s a color change I’m used to.
But then there are produce color changes I’m NOT used to.
1) My white strawberries. Yes, you heard me, white strawberries. I bought these berries last year and they produced some small berries, and have been great for the plucking early on with their small and strange and white berries with a surprising complex flavor. The kids love raiding their bushes. The weird part: One of the bushes has red berries … with white insides. Mind you: They’re supposed to be white. The bigger of the two plants is white in and white out … but then the one bush is bright red out, and bright white inside. What. The. Heck. Anyone have any clue? I’m guessing it has to do with nitrogen or some other mineral issues. This plant is a little lower than the other, and perhaps I didn’t give it as many nutrients (aka … TAGRO). But seriously, it’s weird. And who would have thought I’d be moaning about RED strawberries!?!?!?
2) My peppers. I was so giddy beyond delight this week when I ventured to my back garden and discovered that my four pepper plants had PRODUCED! There are about a dozen small peppers in tween stage, and one actually looked ripe-ish for the picking. Which got me thinking: How do you know when a pepper is ripe? Do you guess? Size can vary, so it’s not that. And then my mother-in-law told me that if you let green peppers stay on the vine, they turn red. Huh? Really? Not quite sure I believe her. Is that really how red peppers happen? If it’s true, how do you get yellow peppers? I guess I assumed there were red peppers, green peppers, yellow peppers, etc. (Heck, at TAGRO headquarters they have PURPLE peppers in their lovely garden — you should check it out.)
Anyone have any answers for me? Anyone have any other examples of crazy-color-shifting produce?
I’m currently scared to see what my eggplants and jalepenos throw at me …
White strawberries? Wow, I learn about something new every day! Funny you should bring up pepper colors. I did some research this week for the newsletter at work and found out that most sweet peppers start green and stay green until fully developed then change color upon ripening. That’s where the red, yellow, orange, purple, brown, black and other colors come in. Who knew?
Comment # 1
Posted by Carla
Aug 29, 09:51 PM
I’ll have to second that. Most peppers start out green, and then turn red or orange when they’re ripe. The Tagro purple pepper start out purple, and supposedly should turn red when they’re done. But in our short summers, you often don’t get peppers to turn into their final colors, so enjoy them while you can!
Comment # 2
Posted by Kristen
Sep 2, 01:44 PM
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