Tomatillo

What’s still green: Arborvitae, juniper and other evergreens, roses, cholla, prickly pear, yuccas, red hot poker, grape hyacinth, hollyhock, winecup, oriental poppy, St. John’s wort, vinca, white sweet clover, alfalfa, catmint, beardtongue, snapdragon, Jupiter’s beard, coral bells, rock rose, sea pink, columbine, yellow evening primrose, perky Sue, Shasta daisy, tansy, coreopsis, cheat grass, bases of needle and June grasses; most trees have shed their leaves.

What’s red or turning red: Young apricot stems, pink evening primrose.

What’s grey, blue-grey or grey-green: Piñon, pinks, snow-in-summer, yellow alyssum, winterfat, Silver King artemisia.

What’s yellow or turning yellow: Bouncing Bess, flax.

What’s blooming inside: Aptenia and asparagus fern; Christmas cactus has buds; .rochea and Christmas cactus leaves tinged with red.

Animal sightings: No sane animal is out these days.

Weather: Temperatures in low teens Tuesday morning; this is as cold as it usually gets when there’s snow on the ground in December; the only insulation now is fallen leaves; rain before midnight last night; 9:02 hours of daylight today.

Weekly update: Tomatillos were grown in the valley of Tehuacán where Richard MacNeish found the first evidence of domesticated corn long before Columbus. They still grow wild in cultivated fields in the highlands of México and Guatemala, especially in areas where ash from burned stubble promotes germination. When I saw seeds for sale, I thought they might be fun to try.

I didn’t realize they were Physalis until they began to take over the garden. None of the seed packages provided a Latin name.

I planted some five-for-a-dollar seeds in the north facing garden in 1996, and they persisted until 2001. I planted more along the eastern retaining wall in 1999, which became so thick, I began pulling them out in 2004. Unfortunately, when they break ground in spring, they look like bouncing Bess and I decimated that colony, without affecting the tomatillos.

I’d grown Physalis alkekengi in Michigan for the orange-colored Chinese lanterns that enclose the fruit, and put it on my never again list. What Hortus discretely described as "long creeping, underground stems" were their most distinctive feature. The seed cases don’t turn color until the fruit is ripe, and these relatives of the tomato have a long maturation period. I rarely saw the seed cases until late in the year, but I saw the leaves and stems everywhere.

My tomatillos have whitish roots that spread underground, while the yellow flowers look like those of tomatoes. The sepals at the top of the down facing flowers extend over the ovaries to produce the lanterns. When they began to turn papery, I wondered when they were ripe enough to pick. Since members of the nightshade family, including some non-hybrid tomatoes, are allergenic, I was cautious about popping one in my mouth.

I asked women who had migrated from México if they knew anything about tomatillos, but they looked as me blankly. I certainly had enough to give away, but could find no takers.

I finally went to the local grocer that caters to people who speak Spanish to see if it carried them, and discovered the ones it imports from México don’t look anything like what I have. Their fruits are the color of unripe tomatoes and resemble golf balls that completely fill their green cases. My fruits are golden olive grapes that hang suspended inside their tan shells.

The real Mexican tomatillos are Physalis ixocarpo. The only seed package I saved that shows the annual is one Burpee marketed to Spanish-speakers in 2000 "para salsa."

The plants I have are probably husk tomatoes. The picture on the Ferry Morse seeds that colonized shows golden yellow fruits and an ecru lantern. The photograph of Lake Valley ones that didn’t germinate is more deceptive. It shows green cases and fruits, but the fruits are small like mine. The first was promoted as "excellent for Mexican salsa" and the other described as "essential for salsas."

There’s nothing actually wrong with Physalis pubescens, except their tendency to colonize. The plants are found throughout north and south America, while tomatillos are believed to have originated in central México. The fruits, which have a sweeter taste than the acidic tomatillos, have been made into pies and jams by Americans from German and British areas. When tomatillos were adopted by Spanish colonists, they made sauces.

Fortunately, husk tomatoes are more easily tamed than the Chinese lanterns. Now I wait until the bouncing Bess is clearly identifiable before pulling most of the volunteers from the irrigated garden, and let them grow where they will in the drip line with the hairy golden asters and hybrid roses. They can hardly overwhelm either, and one of these days I may dare test their edibility.

Notes:
Bailey, Liberty Hyde and Ethel Zoe Bailey. Hortus, 1934.

MacNeish, Richard Stockton. Tehuacan Archaeological-Botanical Project, Annual Report, 1961.

United Nations. Food and Agriculture Organization. Neglected Crops: 1492 from a Different Perspective. Edited by J.E. Hernández Bermejo and J. León, 1994.

Photograph: Tomatillo (top), as sold locally, and husk tomato with manually broken shell, 28 November 2009.