Gardening in the Valley of Heart's Delight

Tomatoes


The tomato harvest is rolling in! Pictured to the right are three of my tomatoes. The dark one is Cherokee Purple. It's not really purple, but is certainly a darker, more burgandy red than most other tomatoes, with a deep and rich flavor. I'll plant these again. The yellow one is Garden Peach. It's not a strongly-flavored tomato, but pleasant and quite prolific. But I probably won't plant them again.		Cherokee Purple, Garden Peach, Green Zebra
I should point out, though, that I'm not a big fan of yellow tomatoes in general. They are usually lower in acid, which appeals to many people, but makes them taste bland to me. I made a rather nice yellow gazpacho using Garden Peaches, but added extra garlic and vinegar to boost the flavor. If anyone would like to try Garden Peaches next year, just drop me e-mail and I'll send you some of my leftover seeds. The green one is Green Zebra. This wonderful tomato turns golden with green stripes when ripe but is still bright green on the inside. Not only does it provide a great color contrast in tomato salads, it has startlingly great tomato flavor. I only wish it were more productive; next year I'll have to plant more.
Banana Legs, still green	I just had to try the Banana Legs tomatoes pictured to the left. Who could resist a name like that? They've turned out to be the strangest, lumpiest tomatoes I've ever grown, looking a lot more like squash than tomatoes. They lose some of their lumpiness as they ripen and swell, but not completely. I'm repeating the picture below from the main page so I can point out the ripe Banana Legs on the lower right-hand side of the bowl. Their flavor is typical for a yellow tomato. They slice up nicely for salads, providing flavor and color contrast. And they're by far the most entertaining tomatoes I've grown. I'm sure I'll plant them again.
The other tomatoes in the bowl are the three discussed above, a couple of standards (Early Girl, Better Boy), German Red Strawberry, and some cherry types: Thai Pink, Riesentraube, and Large Red Cherry. There are also a couple of peppers which are discussed on the next page.		Tomatoes and peppers, oh my!
German Red Strawberry is disappointingly bland, mealy, and dry. Maybe it shines in a different climate, but not here. Thai Pinks are teardrop-shaped, with great flavor (too acid for some people, but I love them) but aren't in the least bit pink, alas. Riesentraube and Large Red Cherry are both yummy cherry tomatoes, the latter somewhat larger than the former. Be warned that I'm not a fan of super-sweet tomatoes, though. I think 'cherry' should refer to the size, not the sweetness of these tomatoes, and find the proliferation of 'Super-Sweets', 'Sugar Lumps' and their ilk a bit dismaying. There's an underlying assumption in American culture that sweeter is better (which is applied to many foods, not just tomatoes). But it isn't always so! We can't help but be programmed by the culture we grow up in, but we can at least try to make our own decisions and not just follow the herd. So decide for yourself how sweet you want your tomatoes to be. And there need not be a single right answer. That's one reason I grow such a wide variety of tomatoes, because I love the variety of flavors. P.S. I'm working on a section for my general information page where I plan to list gardening catalogs and nurseries that I favor, so you too can request catalogs and pore over the tantalizing varieties of seeds. Most of the above tomatoes came from the Totally Tomatoes catalog; I'll provide full information later.