Harvest & Store Tomatoes for Preserving | Comment Response on My Raised Beds 

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I'm 65. I've been canning all of my adult life and I never knew to put my tomatoes in the freezer. The rotting tomatoes on my counter thank you!!!

Living in Tennessee we do truly live on “Old Rocky Top”. I use 90% raised beds because our land is so poor. My beds are like yours all different levels and I have few problems. I think snarky people need a nap!! Love your channel!

Apparently your plants didn't get the memo about growing in "low soil" in your beds! They seem to have found all the soil they need to be growing beautifully and you have had great harvests. Thanks for this vid.

I think you're awesome and don't need to explain why you do things the way you do. Thanks for explaining though.

You’re a great teacher Rachael! Although you don’t need to explain yourself to negative nelly’s! God Bless you! ❤️🥰

I laughed out loud at your "voice" I'm sure those snarky people sound just like that 😂

I’m sending you a virtual hug from across the other side of the world. I hope that the snarky people haven’t tainted your enjoyment of creating and sharing your content. There are so many others here - including myself - that appreciate the work that you and Todd go to to upload every single episode that we see. I did have a little chuckle to myself though. You see I’m doing a no-dig method in my newly renovated vegetable garden. I have wooden raised beds that my husband and I made. WELL.... there is a ‘no-dig’ group that I’m a member of and there are certain people there that will FLAME me for using wooden borders when I share my new garden with the group. I kid you not! It is a big no-no to use raised beds in this particular no-dig group. I’ll get comments and questions like “they’re not necessary” “why did you waste your money and time to make them?” “they’ll give pillbugs and slugs a place to hide and live” and “it’s not a proper ‘no-dig’ garden because you have raised beds” I’ll get tarred as a inexperienced, novice gardener who isn’t ‘serious’ about growing food 😂 And you know what Rachael? I really don’t care what they say or think. Growing food is my passion, I’ve been growing my own food for 19 years, I’m pretty confident that I know what I’m doing 😂 All the toxic people that crave empowerment by snarking at me will suck eggs each and every time that I bring in a harvest! Your beds are clearly working perfectly without being full to the brim with soil. Better then a lot of other people’s I’m sure! So your snarky commentors can go suck eggs too!

I freeze mine too! It's so much easier, and you can get a larger amount done.

Don't pay attention to Snarky People, they've probably never planted a garden before. They're just jealous of what you have accomplished. Due to my age and back problems I can't bend over to garden. I am in the process of building raised beds with old metal roofing panels. Yes, we all have had failures in our gardens. For me it's Egg Plants. I finally gave up and plant things I know grow well in my area of SW Ohio. The Farmer's Market is great place to buy my Egg Plants.

I really love how the raised beds look, it's much more neat and organized looking. I built a few this year and they are way easier to work around! I will most likely switch up most of my in ground garden over to shallow raised beds so I can have some walking room plus it's much easier on my back to have something that I can lean against while planting/weeding. The way I see it is if you have good garden soil all you really require is a bed border tall enough to keep the wood chips out and the top dressing in :)

Love your channel, so many great tips and lessons! So much negativity in the world, there always seems to be someone who wants to teardown other people, not cool. The snarky people of the world need to spend a little more time looking inwards. May you and your family stay well😊

Yess girrl! I've been working on my giant raised bed (built around a huge birch tree) for 3 years. It started out as dead dirt, and this year... HOLY MOLY did my efforts pay off. I grew a jungle this year without even trying. Lettuce, calendula, lupins, mint, etc. Just exploded. The bees are so happy. ❤😊

Your yields should speak for themselves. Those that have negative comments or attitudes will always" be" and you can happily ignore them. You are a success and you ROCK! Working full time AND doing this? Wowzer.

You are awesome and poo on the negative people. Your garden and stocked pantry speaks for itself

LOL I totally do the voice for those negative remarks too 🤣♥️

Sometimes when we can our own salsa and have an abundance of cherry tomatoes we'll toss some in whole, skins and all. We really like the addition they make. Many never make it inside from the garden, though. 😉

rachel, I'm so sorry you have to deal with snark. If people don't like what they hear or see they can just change the youtube channel!!!! Thank you for sharing, your beds are lovely and you hav been a great inspiration for me, my gardens, and food preservation.

You tell ‘em Rachel ! If you want to garden wearing a tutu while standing on your head, that’s your choice! And however you created your raised beds, well it certainly is working. Your harvest is beautiful !

I love you and everything you are doing! My husband built me 14 raised beds (because our soul isn't ideal) in my garden and absolutely LOVE them! Our harvest is amazing and gets better and better each year. Love your raised beds❤

Great tip on freezing them until you have enough. I have never heard this, thank you :)

I accidentally snapped a tomato stem in half. I taped it back together with green garden tape and then taped it to the post, and it healed up. Even had roots growing under the tape. Maybe that will work?

love your videos but i was wondering... why are your raised beds lacking in dirt? Plus is that bleached sugar in the background? I really thought you knew better (evry youtuber will get it =) lol good tomato canning tips

I keep my cherry tomatoes in a small colander so they have air circulation just in case one gets over ripe it leaks on the counter and I see it. I did not have a lot.of varieties this year mostly I have used our extra tomatoes for salsa. I like the boards around a bed. I have them around my in ground garden just because it looks nice and makes it easy to mow or weed eat around.

Great video! Love that volunteer tomato - it knew the best place to grow, didn’t it! Beautiful raised beds. 😊thanks for the tomato freezing tip, too.

Before I freeze my tomatoes I like to cut the core out and score the bottom. Makes peeling even easier! Plus I’m usually too impatient to fully defrost them before putting them on the stove, and frozen cores are harder to scoop out 😂 I also throw whole cherry tomatoes in the freezer, they are great to toss into a sauté pan with other veggies

I absolutely love your garden!!

Rachel, I have learned SO much from you since subscribed to your site this spring. Please ignore the comments and keep moving on, just the way you do in your no-nonsense way of communication and teaching those of us newcomers to gardening. Many thanks.

Your beds seem to be very productive and supply you with a abundance of beautiful foods. Mission accomplished👍

I love your raised beds and garden area! It's all beautiful to me ❤️ Ours has lotsa weeds in with it, not nearly so tidy looking. Been binge watching your channel since I just had a tooth extraction and can't do much else for a few days. Love you guys! Keep doing what you doing. God bless!

This taught me so much! I plan to put a raised garden in my back yard next year. Thank you so much 😊

I like the nice trimmed way your garden looks. Gardening is FREEDOM! I have gardened for 35 years - I should say “Yardened” because it is one 40 by 50 patch in our backyard. I learn something new every year. I am learning from you! Thank you.

I look forward to your videos. I get so much information from you guys. So thank you!

I've been watching your harvest progress and it looks like you're doing just fine. Thank you so much for sharing your time with us.

Always enjoy your videos. You garden in whatever way makes you happy. From looks of your results its working great for you. Have a GREAT day !

I LOVE your garden. This is my second year with raised beds. I have fractured back and love them. In the fall my son pushed mowed around huge maple tree and dumps into raised beds too. I love how you can control what is put in your raised beds. Love your videos. Thank you.

I found your channel a couple of weeks ago and I've been binge watching... I think you do a great job.

It's your garden do with it as you please and best fits your needs!!! I enjoy your channel immensely and wish you and Todd all the best!!! Have wonderful weekend!!!

I’ve been up in the mountains, so just watched this. Thanks for the info on the raised beds. And you look beautiful in this too!

Just loved that deep voice. Liked the explanation of beds/boxes. Gives ideas. 😇

Thank you for sharing all you do. I’ve learned so much from you on your channel. My daughter and I love to watch your show. I don’t know how you have the energy to do all you do but you’ve inspired me to try more . Your very much appreciated!

I am suscribed to your channel, and others, to learn. I have learned so much! Each gardener has his/her own way of doing things. And each of us has room to learn as well as teach. So don't let the snarkies bother you. If you are fulfilled with your beautiful garden, then that's all you could ever want! Enjoy it and keep making videos, because i, for one, am learning a bunch!!!

No worries! Your garden is beautiful!

My asparagus loves my raised garden bed similar to yours. Enjoy your videos and thanks for sharing your knowledge.

Absolutely adore you and your family. Your property and home are beautiful as is your soul. I can only hope one day my gardens can grow like yours. Because this year? I've battled every type of bug you can imagine. But what comes in, I'm grateful. Cheers!

Rachel, thank you for answering the question I had just yesterday about tomatoes, (not raised beds, LOL, ). Tomatoes coming in every day and I finally cooked up a sauce with them, but glad to know you can freeze until they accumulate for canning THANK YOU, love the channel! GB you all.

I do my tomatoes like that, then take 2-3 days off work in the fall, to make my pasta sauce for the year. I do fruit for jams the same way. Spreading the canning over time, keeps me sane.

I thank you for telling us about the soil for your raised beds, especially since I hope to create some raised beds this fall for net year's gardens.

I've been following MI gardener for a while. I really like his approach also. We put in raised beds this year also. I, like you, enjoy the aesthetic look of the symmetry with the beds.

Yeah, I do the same thing with my leaves and plant beds. It works. God is good. 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰

I think your beds looks just fine. And your garden overall is absolutely wonderful.

You have taught several things I love how you explain the reason you do things. Please don't listen to the snarky people . 😁💗😁

Lol, you're funny. Love your comment on your random tomato plant. 🤣

I think you are a terrific gardener. Wish I was half as good.

Your a trooper to explain it to non-gardeners. I started decades ago like you have there and it was mostly for containment of the primo soils and nice mulched weed free paths just like you have there. I'm old now and my raised beds are now 2 feet high and sooooo much easier on my back. Happy gardening to you too.

I don't have anymore room in backyard, so I started planting in containers. I got 12 tomato plants in containers. In my flower bed, I have 4 huge tomato plants. I do have a small raised bed that I call my salad bowl. 6 swiss chard, 6 kale, 8 lettuces. In another area, I have zucchini, egg plant, green beans, bell peppers, and carrots. I still have stuff to plant for fall.

I love learning from your channel! It encourages me and many others. Now speaking of tomatoes. This year I tried preserving cherry tomatoes like I saw on Elliott Homestead. Roasted and preserved in oil. WOW! 🤯 So easy, so good and small batches are easy. Wish I'd done more.

You handled the questions and comments so well. I've tried true raised beds when we had clay soil, had traditional rows at our current home and 3yrs ago went to sectioned beds that are only for growing. No walking to press down the dirt, focused areas to amend the dirt, easier to weed and they look pretty! By the way, love your garden set up and might steal a few ideas from it.

Great video, you grow the way you grow, love it keep on growing!👍🍒

I love your tomato tip. I also love your raised beds and showed them to my husband. I am going to have him build me raised beds like your this fall for next year. We are gardening in the ground and although we use woven ground cover to help with weeds, it is too intense on our bodies to garden in the ground anymore. Next spring I will have a beautiful garden like Rachael. Hugs❤️

"Beautiful process", and a beautiful garden. 💖💕

🌻 I like your garden design 😎. I was raised in Michigan so I understand the soil. Now I'm in northern Alabama with clay soil so I'm learning how to garden in the south and having raised beds. Love watching a fellow Michigander garden. 😊🍆🌶🍅🌽

The thumbnail alone made me click! I was like.... YASSS! Also I have way too many tomatoes and we are about to go into high season for vegetable gardening and I’m learning so much from you in preserving! You do you!

Thanks for the tomato tip. My first tomato garden this year and have been struggling with this exact problem.

This makes me feel better about my raised bed decision. They were already here when I moved in built on field dirt it was all clay and some top soil. I have spent years and a lot of money amending it and this year I decided I could not continue to put so much money into the soil so I brought straw hoping it would keep the soil lite. I keep seeing videos about feeding the soil and not just the plants but this video really demonstrates how good soil health can yield a big harvest.

Oh thank you so much for your idea for the tomatoes. I would get so frustrated with not having enough ripe tomatoes to can. I hate snarky people. I do my raised beds the same as you. Love your videos you have helped me so much!!!

Every gardener has their own style! Beginner or expert. Everyone grows what they want, amend how they want and use the type/amount of soil you want. Some people mulch, others don’t. Some are organic, some use insecticide. I applaud anyone trying their best to grow their own food or even doing it for a hobby! I was happy to see your beds. I felt bad not planting in ground.

I saw your garden beds before and thought "ah! She's smart! Still gardening in the ground but with the opportunity to control the type of nutrient supplements and weeds! 💗

Love ya Rachel...obviously you have proof that it works. I laughed so hard at your "voices"!! I do the same thing. 😂 You Do You! Everyone has different things that work for them but I always try to follow someone who has proof that it works. Keep doing what you're doing. ❤

Actually I find this information very helpful. I am a new gardener in so Cal. Super happy with my harvest but suffer from raised bed envy. Mostly because my soil is lower now. Thought I was doing something wrong and wasn’t going to invest in more soil mixture. I guess bumper harvests should determine success!! Love your channel and am getting loads of hints and tips from you! Thanks!

I just pulled out my measly 7# of tomatoes from my freezer and made 4 pints of BBQ sauce to go with the 1/4 pig we just ordered. My house smells so good. Freezing tomatoes was such a helpful tip. I had no clue till last year

Perfect timing! Exactly how my tomatoes are coming in!

My beds look just like yours and I totally agree it works...love your garden area!! Gardens are our personal experience with nature. I'm doing the same rotation with my tomatoes and if tomatoes don't ripen I foresee you making your mock strawberry jelly with them :0) Happy Gardening to all!!

I have a mixture of raised beds and regular soil and 2 Back to Eden woodchip gardens. The raised beds are filled as yours are and low. Whatever I plant in them do great and top them off in the fall with whatever is in the finished compost bed and covered with fall leaves thickly to await spring. Grass clippings used in paths (except in woodchip gardens) and worms galore all around. Enjoy your channel. Keep doing what you are doing..showing us how you garden..how you preserve the fruits of your labor.

I weigh my bags and write that info and the date on the bag so I can pull out the weight I need for a canner load of tomatoes. I so enjoy your video content! Keep up the good work...we are all learning so much!

This is the second video of yours that I have seen. I was kinda wondering in the first video about the soil level, but I only just built my first raised beds this year and I noticed even though I overloaded them all to the point they were massive hills, the soil level went down to the halfway point, so I figured this is just normal so I didn't think too much of it. I too do the Core garden method, and I have in my inground garden for years. But you do you. You don't have to answer to anybody if what you do works for you, that is great. People think they got a right to an opinion about things that don't concern them. They gotta learn to mind their own business. I love how you addressed it. Good job!

I'm glad you addressed this! I was one of the genuinely curious people wondering if maybe it wasn't necessary to keep them packed full. I'm looking build some kind of no dig garden this fall. Our soil is crap so I wondered if only a few inches of compost would work for me.

We do the exact same thing when canning our tomatoes....we freeze them in gallon bags then prick a hole in the bag when we take them out so the excess water can drain as the tomatoes thaw....usually we do not peel them because we make sauce out of them (about 12 gallon bags at a time)....we put them in a turn-style sauce maker to remove the skin and seeds and it works great!

Greetings from Australia! I found this funny when it appeared in my feed. I was only watching one of your videos yesterday and thought “hmm I wonder why her bed isn’t full to the top?”. No judgement, just curiosity. Shame you had to explain yourself. Loving your videos. Just purchased myself a canner and have my vegies growing well. Excited to get canning.

I hope the positive comments outweigh the snarky ones. Everyone has a different way of doing things and for different reasons. I never wondered about your soil level but I liked hearing the why...good info and food for thought. I really liked your tomato tip for saving them in the freezer for canning later! Thanks for producing great content!

Great tips thank you. We also has a high wind storm roll threw and topple my tomatoes! * IM ON THE MICHIGAN INDIANA line*

Oh the voice made me laugh so much as I sometimes do that when someone makes a horrible comment - Loved It !!!

This is exactly how I normally fill my garden beds. Our soil here in northern Alabama is atrocious. While I *do* have a couple really tall beds, and I LOVE them - would love to have gobs of them, the lower raised beds are easier and more economical to build and fill. For us, because we get such wet winters, and have so much standing water, raised beds are the best way to do it. Loved the thumbnail - "you do you." Good philosophy for a lot of things ;) I have had tomato branches break, and look like the are broken badly, but then actually continue to grow and produce more fruit, not just ripen the existing ones. So while it may not be pretty, those fallen branches are often not lost.

P.s. thanks for the tip on the tomatoes! I’ve been coming and freezing separately for ages and it’s really time consuming. You’ve saved me a lot of effort 👍🏻👍🏻

you go girl!!! every well said...!!!

Thanks for the freezing tip. I will use it!

Thanks for the tip of freezing the tomatoes 🍅 more than likely I will do that!

Touché Rachael...I love your raised beds...you work really hard in your garden and not much gets to you except those dog gone beets eh? Your such a strong lady and I love your Vlogs. Keep on gardening with so much love to give Rachael. I will keep on watching and enjoying them!!

It's a good question especially for people who aren't real experienced gardeners. I have only gardened using raised beds and they always look nice and full at the beginning of the season after I amend them and mulch, but always look half full at the end of season. My pots do the same. I have clay soil here and I know that growing in and amending these raised beds over the last couple of years has improved the condition of the soil underneath because I can actually put a shovel in it now if I wanted to, haha! I couldn't do that before as it was as hard as a brick :) I love raised beds though - they look great, neat and tidy, and they prevent weed spread from the edges into the bed. I love your garden layout. I add a bed every year and someday it may come close to yours.

You’re way too lovable to be snarky at! I loved the way you addressed it with the voice and all!

One of my limbs broke too because of wt. but not completely off. Just like yours. I found a brick and let the tomatoes rest on it and then I put a zip tie around the limb to kinda pull it back in again. That was three weeks ago and I didn’t lose any tomatoes! They’re turning red now.

I had a loaded tomato branch snap this year, and I taped it back together right away and it survived. Crazy.

Thank you for that explanation. I have gardened for 30 plus years, this is my first year wuth raised beds. I filled them. And they are now at about half. I knew I would have to amend them, but didnt know if they needed to be full again. I usually have lots of tomatoes that I can mid season. But, I freeze what we don't eat in the first few weeks, and again at the tail end of tomato season. I have probably 8 or 9 gallon bags frozen right now, waiting for me to get busy canning.

You are awesome. Snarky would equal delete in my world. Blessings to you.

You're doing fine for your soil type. Everyone is different. Mine is clay & I do the same as you, so my soil improves to deep richness..

Love your videos no matter if u have 4 inches of soil or 12 inches

Thanks for sharing friend you are very kind to other people snarky comments bother me like someone said someone needs a nap i want to build some raised beds .

What works for you is what you should do. I haven't been able to garden for many yrs I hope next yr I can, I will probably do 1/2 in containers the other 1/2 raised beds....But it's nice to know I wouldn't necessarily have to top off the raised beds

I love your raised bed garden. It reminds me sort of similar to the gardens in Williamsburg, Va. They have the little picket fences or some type of fencing and inside they have the bordered garden beds with distinct path ways. So neat and orderly...just like yours. BTW, if you remember I mentioned the 8 ball zucchini growing in my yard from under the neighbors fence...well I stuffed a half of one with a meat mixture and baked it. It took so much longer to bake than the recipe said I put it in the fridge and ate half of it for supper tonight. It was delicious. The taste was rather like a cross between spaghetti squash and acorn squash. The flesh is a pale yellow and I put butter in the cavity before adding the cooked meat mixture. Yum. Just thought you might like to know. Have a Blessed day.

I like your response Rachel! I have raised beds because San Diego soil is terrible! I amend my soil with compost, minerals and organic fertilizer.