I know this goes against what you are suppose to do, but I've been putting them in my greenhouse. They are in direct sunlight and it gets around 90 degrees in there. There's a roof vent that kicks on when the temp gets up there and it seems to keep it from getting real hot. Usually takes 2 -3 days and they are ripe enough to process. I always pick mine when they start turning orange or else the bugs get most of them. The paste type I just put in boxes - this is what they look like when I pick them And this is 2 -3 days later. Paste type are quite firm so they don't get squished like the bigger ones would. In each batch, I usually end up with a handful of really green ones (picking mistakes) but they all ripen up nicely. I'm hoping the weather holds a few more weeks - while the paste type are about done, the big eating ones are just getting started. I'm in south central SD. Cathy

Can you leave them on the vine until they start to turn red? If you pick them while they're totally green, they'll never get completely ripe, though they will redden and soften somewhat. If they get a chance to turn red on the vine, they will ripen better. Ethylene is what "ripens" them so you can put them in a bag if you want, or just let them sit on the counter, preferably in the sun. We are only seeing lows in the 60s in Richmond...why not leave them on the vine until the first frost? Melissa

No it's been around since pioneer days and works, for the most part. Some will rot and some won't ripen but the majority will. The main problem is all the wrapping and unwrapping and re-wrapping to check them every few days. No big deal if you only have 15-20 fruit. Another issue if you have 100+ fruit. Various methods come up regularly over on the Growing Tomatoes forum and range from the paper-bag-with-a-ripe apple (basically ethylene gas ripening), the method you describe, and the pull-up-and-hang-the-plant-upside down-from-the-rafters method. That last one is what works best for us since we usually have 50+ plants with fruit on them and the big barn rafters to use. Basement or garage rafters also work just not as convenient. And of course you can always leave the plants in the garden but cover them well until the fruit hit color break and then pick them. Dave

Just put them in the house in the kitchen on a counter or somewhere else away from the sun, meaning no windowsill which dries them out and no paper bags with a cut apple or whatever since all that does is to increase the concentration of the gas ethylene, which is part of the ripening process naturally but when in a paper bag it's like the gassing of fruits that is done commercially and those are the anemic looking lousy tasting fruits that we see in the winter. I hope that there's at least a blush on those fruits since total greenies don't usually ripen up with the best of tastes, but since you already have harvested the fruits, just go fo it. Well, that certainly was a long sentence. LOL BTW the name of the variety is Cherokee Purple, not Purple Cherokee and I ought to know since my best friend Craig LeHoullier named it, but Seeds by Design in CA, a wholsale place, sent out seed lists with Purple Cherokee on it and maybe still does. Carolyn, who is envious of ANYONE with mature fruits these days, b'c her plants are so behind that it's dicey that anything will mature before the first killing frost. There, she said it, killing frost. Sigh.