Tips for Ripening Hybrid Cherry Tomatoes

How to Ripen Cherry Tomatoes

Cherry tomatoes are easy to grow in containers and there are many delicious recipes you can use them in. If you have green, unripe hybrid cherry tomatoes rather than juicy red ones, you will be interested in some methods for ripening hybrid cherry tomatoes.

Hybrid cherry tomato plants normally yield more fruit than regular tomato plants and you should get fruit from midsummer until the last frost. Steps for ripening green cherry tomatoes are handy to know about. Cherry tomato care in itself is quite minimal and preserving cherry tomatoes by keeping them in a cool dry place is easy. They keep well for a week in the refrigerator.

How to Tell if Hybrid Cherry Tomatoes are Ready to Pick

You need to harvest hybrid cherry tomatoes regularly. You can pick green cherry tomatoes which are slightly red and slightly soft rather than hard green ones which have not matured because these will not ripen. Ripening green cherry tomatoes is possible as long as you pick ones which have begun to ripen.

The hybrid cherry tomatoes mature time varies and, to check if your cherry tomatoes are mature, you can cut one in half. If the inside is sticky or jelly-like and yellowish, it will ripen when you pick it. If the tomatoes are still hard and green inside and there is a frost coming, move the plants to a dry, sheltered location, avoiding extremes such as total darkness or direct sunlight. The hybrid cherry tomatoes will ripen in their new location.

Ripening Green Hybrid Cherry Tomatoes in Jars

One method for ripening cherry tomatoes when green is to put them in jars with a ripening banana in and seal the lid tightly. Leave the jars in a warm, slightly humid place, away from direct sunlight. If the banana begins to rot before the cherry tomatoes are ripe, replace it with a new one. You can use a paper bag instead of jars for this. It will take a week or two for the cherry tomatoes to ripen.

Ripening Green Hybrid Cherry Tomatoes in a Plastic Bag

This method for ripening green cherry tomatoes is similar to the above method but you can use a plastic bag rather than jars or paper bags. You should punch some air circulation holes in the plastic bags and put several green cherry tomatoes in each one with one ripening banana. Store the bags is a warm, slightly humid place and the tomatoes will ripen within a week or two.

The humidity level is important because too little humidity will give you dehydrated hybrid cherry tomatoes and too much will encourage rotting and fruit flies. You might know about soil, pests and how to deal with them but it is better not to attract them in the first place.

If you have a lot of cherry tomatoes, you can stack them in a newspaper-lined cardboard box and add ripening bananas. As long as the tomatoes have started to ripen, they will become totally ripe with the ethylene they produce but using bananas ripens them quicker.

Using bananas works for ripening hybrid cherry tomatoes because they produce ethylene, which is a gas that helps with the ripening process. All ripening fruits produce this gas but bananas produce more than most other fruits and can boost the ripening of the cherry tomatoes. Ripening bananas are yellow with green on the ends.

Ripening hybrid cherry tomatoes with a banana is simple, as long as you have somewhere warm and slightly humid. Once the tomatoes are ripe, you should eat them within a few days for the best flavour.

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