Greenhouse Tomatoes

In a matter of a couple of weeks, the season of freshness -- thank goodness -- will be upon us. Though we go through the same cycle year after year, that first taste of locally grown goodness never ceases to thrill. The wait, like the cold weather itself, always seems endless.

But up at Stuart Horst's farm north of Elmira, just a stone's throw from Floradale, harvest started about six weeks ago. The beefsteak and grape tomatoes he planted in his greenhouse back in late December began to ripen in early March and from there in, Horst, his family, and staff have been busily packaging up and selling their wares to those of us eager for a taste of homegrown freshness.

Shopping at Vincenzo's, one of the region's farmers' markets or at Elmira Foodland, you may have seen the clear, plastic pint-sized containers of grape tomatoes sold under the Elmira's Own label -- these come from Horst's Floralane Produce. He sells about 10 per cent of his grape tomatoes and 25 per cent of his beefsteaks at the farm gate; the rest can be found at the locations above. It's possible you might be eating them when dining out, too -- at Crossroads Restaurant in Elmira or Charbries in Uptown Waterloo, for starters.

What makes Horst's grape tomatoes tastier than those little plastic containers shipped up from Mexico?

"We leave them on the vine until they're riper," Horst, an Old Order Mennonite, explains. "That helps to create a flavour that people like. We don't have to ship them far, so we can let them ripen longer."

Mexican tomatoes are picked before they're ripe, partly because they have so much further to travel before they're sold, and partly so they can be churned out faster because, the sooner they're picked, the sooner the plant can produce more fruit. "You can get more poundage if you grow that way," Horst says.

Ah, but you don't get that sweet flavour.

In the greenhouse industry, output is measured by kilograms per square metre. Last year, Floralane grew 50 kilograms per square metre of beefsteak tomatoes and 20 kilograms per square metre of grape tomatoes. They produced 29,000 pints of grape tomatoes and hope to do the same in 2009.

Horst grows his tomatoes without chemicals. "I'm very excited about our biological program," he says. "I was just in putting more bugs into the greenhouse, wasps and so on to eat up the crop damaging pests. It seems to work well."

New this year are green beans from the greenhouses, too, although, laughs Horst, "I dare not mention them. People are fighting for them already and we don't have near enough. I've got orders on the board filled before they've even grown."

Business at Floralane is ever-expanding. On top of the half-acre tomato greenhouse, there are smaller ones sheltering flowers for the bedding plants and baskets they sell in spring and summer, chickens bearing eggs, and, in warm weather, a shop that sells produce and baked goods (they also plan to sell their own brand of homemade salsa this summer, too).

The family also runs a community supported agriculture (CSA) program that has customers pay upfront in spring for a share of the farm's weekly vegetables right through until the growing season ends.

Growing business means Horst has added to his staff this year; the family suffered a tragedy last December when Horst's business partner, Melvin Martin, was killed while riding his bicycle. "It was a great loss to us here," he says, adding that Martin's widow "still enjoys working in the greenhouse with her four little daughters."

Elmira's Own Tomatoes will be grown and sold right through summer until early December. At that point, they'll replant, let the greenhouse work its magic until March, and the harvest will start all over again.
-30-