Tomatoes

Here are some of the tomato varieties we've grown, with photos and our thoughts on them. They're all available as seed from heritage harvest seeds, or Baker Creek Seeds.


Black Krim/Cherokee Purple: I'm lumping these two together because they are very similar, even though they're distinct strains, it's pretty tough to tell them apart. These are dark reddish brown with green shoulders, still somewhat green while fully ripe, very smooth flesh, perfect for slicing and eating fresh- the smoothest, juiciest tomato I've ever eaten. Great flavour- acidic & complex. These tomatoes make great sauce, juice and salsa too. This is the first Heirloom anything we grew- and we were so amazed by it that now heirloom varieties of everything are all we grow.

Costoluto Genovese: These are one of the oldest heirloom varieties and are really good for sauce- they're beautiful bright red and ribbed- really lovely looking tomatoes. I find them a bit bland and not the greatest texture for eating fresh- but they make a very nice bright red sauce- and they're our favorite for sauce, a really classic flavour.

Jaune Flammee: Very nice small salad tomatoes, they are sweet and mild- but still very flavourful, smooth fleshed, and juicy- when fully ripe they are orange red in the center and yellow outside. These make a nice sauce too.

Pirkstine Orange: sausage shaped orange paste tomatoes. Really nice mildly sweet flavour, these are smooth fleshed but not really great eaten fresh, they are very meaty with few watery seeds- this makes a big difference when you're making sauce- not as many seeds to squeeze out!

Marizol Gold: Lovely looking tomatoes- very very big, 2 lbs each fruit! Yellow with red marbling. Not  very acidic, mild sweet flavour,  meaty fruit.

Black Cherry: really nice cherry tomatoes- big producer- dark red fruit, almost purple. Acidic, smooth and juicy. Really nice as oven dried tomatoes- though they go sort of brown when dried.

Pearly Pink: we use these for oven dried tomatoes, though they're tasty on their own- bigger Roma style cherry tomatoes, they're a bit like a paste tomato, so they dry down really nice- and keep their bright colour.

Ivory Pear: my new favorite cherry tomato- so beautiful, and a nice bright acidic taste, with a complex flavour.- we haven't used these ones for anything yet- as they're just ripening- but boy are they delicious.

Arbuznyi: Really outstanding tomato- I almost prefer these ones to be a little green, they have a really nice complex acidic taste- almost floral, very juicy and smooth. They have a lovely green striping, that stays even when they're ripe.