Heirloom Tomatoes-Taste the Rainbow!

Once again, it’s time to start putting out your tomato plants.  If you’re hoping for a crop with the old-fashioned full-bodied tomato flavor like the ones your grandparents grew then your best bet would be to plant heirloom tomatoes.  So what are heirloom tomatoes?  And which ones grow best here in Tallahassee? In general tomatoes fall into two categories; hybrid and open-pollinated.

Hybrids are the first generation offspring of two distinct parents. A specific “mother” flower is pollinated by specific “father” pollen. The resulting seed produces a tomato plant and fruit that is different than either parent plant. This involves a lot of work and partly accounts for the high cost of hybrid seed.  Hybrid tomatoes have been bred for uniformity, disease resistance and the ability to withstand mechanical harvesting, packing and shipping. Unfortunately this usually comes at the cost of flavor. The biggest disadvantage of hybrids in my opinion is that they don’t come true from seed. This means you have to buy new seed every year. If you try to plant seed saved from your hybrid fruit, you will end up with an entirely different and unpredictable plant.

Open-pollinated tomatoes are varieties that have been genetically stabilized by someone patiently selecting desirable fruit and growing out generations of tomatoes. This usually takes several years, but once a variety is stabilized it will come true from seed.  That means the plants and their fruit will be the same from year to year.

Heirlooms are open-pollinated varieties that have been passed down through several generations of a family or community because of their valued characteristics. These varieties are dynamic, that is they mutate and adapt to your environment as you save seed from year to year.  Therefore the ‘Cherokee Purple’ your neighbor has been growing from year to year is likely to be better adapted to Tallahassee weather than the ‘Cherokee Purple’ seeds you order from a seed farm in Iowa.  Ask your nursery if it gets its plants from local growers who save seed.

Heirlooms come in a myriad of colors, sizes and flavors.  So what varieties of heirlooms should you plant?  I like to plant a few tried and true varieties that I have saved and grow every year, along with a few new ones to experiment with.  I am looking for tomatoes that not only taste great, but are productive and reliable enough to earn their space in my garden.

Here are a few of my top tomatoes:

• ‘Jaune Flamme’ is an old French heirloom bearing abundant, early crops of 4oz fruits with bright orange skin. Its excellent flavor is a perfect blend of sweet and tart! They are delicious fresh in salads or dried. This “yellow flame” has been the first to ripen in my garden for the last two years.

• ‘Speckled Roman’ has gorgeous long red fruits with jagged orange and yellow stripes. These paste tomatoes produce heavy yields of 4-5oz fruit with meaty flesh and few seeds. They have a great “tomato” taste and are great for processing and fresh eating. They also store well once they are picked.

• ‘Matt’s Wild Cherry’ these small red cherry tomatoes are packed with an intense, sweet and full flavor. Originally from Mexico, these large plants produce copious quantities all season. Great for fresh snacking in the garden and in salads or pasta.

• ‘Paul Robeson’ is a beautiful, “black” beefsteak tomato that is really a dusty, dark red. This Russian heirloom has a luscious, earthy flavor with a good sweet/acid balance. I’ve been very impressed with its productivity.

And these two I am excited to trial in my garden this year:

• ‘Mandarin Cross’ a Japanese variety that produces bright orange 6-10oz round fruits with a mild sweetness.

• ‘Costoluto Genovese’ an old Italian heirloom with very large, stunning tomato with deep ribbing that is known for its intensely flavorful deep red flesh.

Tomato Season Is Here!

It may seem early, but it’s time to start planting tomatoes if you want to harvest early fruit. Unlike peppers and eggplant, tomatoes will tolerate cool evenings as long as they are protected from frost. Peppers and eggplants don’t like to be planted out until the evening temperatures are consistently above 50 degrees. Planting too early can stunt their growth. Although tomatoes are much more cold tolerant, I recommend protecting them if the temperature is predicted to drop below 35 degrees. The small, young plants can be easily protected by placing an upside down pot, or halved plastic milk carton over the plant.

Homegrown tastes best!

Tomatoes seem to be a common entry plant for beginner vegetable gardeners. Why are tomatoes so seductive? The varieties of flavors, colors, shapes and sizes that are available to grow at home greatly surpass what’s available in your grocery store. The quality of flavor is also worlds above store-bought tomatoes. I am always resentful if I have to purchase a store bought tomato in winter. I usually avoid it, as even the expensive, heirloom varieties sold in stores cannot compare in flavor to a delicious, sun warmed tomato plucked at its’ peak of ripeness.

Tomatoes are also fairly easy to grow-even for beginners, and you get a lot of bang for your buck. Choosing the right variety is important for first-time success. Unfortunately, I see a lot of beginners choosing the large, beefsteak varieties to try for their first tomato plant. This is usually a mistake. I always recommend beginners plant the cherry-type tomatoes their first year. The larger the fruit, the more difficult it is to grow. Cherry tomatoes are more vigorous, pest-resistant, drought tolerant and shade tolerant than larger tomatoes. Some of my favorite cherry varieties are Matt’s Wild Cherry, Sungold, Risenstraube and Black Cherry. Slightly larger tomatoes like my all-time favorite, Jaune Flamme, are also easier to grow.

‘Jaune Flamme’ Tomato

As usual, I will be planting some of my tried and true favorites this year like Jaune Flamme, Eva Purple Ball, Sungold and my newest favorite, Mandarin Cross. This year, however, I will be saving space for some exceptional new varieties I am really excited to try. In December I purchased seed from Brad Gates at Wild Boar Farms in Napa, CA. He has carefully cultivated these unique varieties through crossing and selecting plants from different heirloom varieties. He selects for production, disease resistance, striking looks and “outrageous” flavor.  His tomatoes definitely look different, but they have been getting rave reviews across the country. They all have interesting names like Dragon’s Eye, Red Boar, and Pink Berkeley Tie-Dye, to match their striking looks. The AAA Sweet Solano looks particularly mouth watering to me! We will only have a limited amount of these tomatoes plants grown from the seed I purchased, as it is still limited and expensive. However, all of his varieties are open-pollinated. This means you can save seed from your crop this year to replant, knowing that you’ll get a plant next year with the same attributes.  I will be planting one of every variety we are trying, and I’d love to hear how they do for other Tallahassee growers.

Happy planting to you all and may you soon be swimming in a sea of tomatoes!

Homegrown taters!

To me, all homegrown vegetables taste better than store bought. A few, however, taste so much better homegrown that I almost never bother buying them from the store. Tomatoes, eggplant, broccoli and cucumbers all fall into that category. I never thought that potatoes would be included until I finally grew them at home for the first time five years ago. A spud was a spud, I assumed, and they were so inexpensive in the grocery store anyways. The whole process of growing and “hilling” potatoes also intimidated me.

Indeed, I was wrong. I grew Red Pontiacs that first year and have ever since. Garden-fresh potatoes are so creamy and smooth, they truly taste as if they’ve already been buttered-up for you. My favorite recipe for them includes fresh garden sage leaves, and is so simple, easy and delicious, it has become one of my favorite dishes (I’ll include the recipe below). I love this recipe so much; I tried making it after I ran out of potatoes one year and substituted them with store-bought. Well I learned my lesson. The homegrown potatoes were what made the dish so delicious. Those grocery spuds tasted like wax in comparison. How disappointing. Potatoes are also pretty easy to grow. Here in Tallahassee they are traditionally planted around Valentine’s Day, and harvested by May. My friends Katie and Aaron, who run Full Earth Farm in Quincy, have a traditional Valentines Potato-date every February. There are many ways to plant potatoes, but I’ve been most successful with the following technique;

Make a trench 10 inches wide and 4 inches deep on level ground. Place a 2 inch layer of compost in the bottom. Cut Seed potatoes in halves or quarters, making sure there is at least one sprouting ‘eye’ in each piece. Allow cut potatoes to air-dry and callus over for a few days. Press each, cut side down, into the compost in the center of the trench to form a hill about 7 inches above the ground. I like to then cover them with mulch to prevent weeds.

By the end of April, the green tops will start yellowing and dying back and that means those little taters are sizing up underground. I use a garden fork to lift up the tubers with the least amount of damage. This is my favorite part of the growing process, because it feels like you’re digging up buried treasure. It’s a great activity for kids (of all ages). So set a potato-date and save this recipe for your harvest!

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Roasted Sage Taters

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 425°F. 
2. Scrub and dry the potatoes. 3.Pour the oil into a heavy oven-proof skillet, preferably of cast iron, and spread evenly. Lay a thick bed of sage leaves flat on the oiled surface, completely covering the bottom of the pan.
4. Sprinkle the salt over the sage. It may look like too much salt, but it’s not.
5. Cut small potatoes in half or large ones in quarters and arrange, cut side down, on the sage.
6. Bake, uncovered, until the potatoes are tender and the cut sides are crusty brown, usually about 35 min.

Ingredients:

2 lb. Red Pontiac potatoes
2 Tbs. extra-virgin olive oil
20-30 fresh sage leaves
1 tsp. coarse sea salt 4 servings