The time of year has arrived. I finally have a few tomatoes ripening in the garden.

One thing I can see is that even though I feel like my tomatoes are ripening later this year, by the reckoning of the blog, my tomatoes are ripening a few weeks earlier.

Tomatoes ripening means that it is time for tomato tastings. Over the next several weeks I will cover my opinions on the tomatoes in my garden. As before, I invite all the other tomato lovers in the blogosphere to join along on your blog with your own tomato tastings. Feel free to drop a link to your tastings in the comments.

Here is the list of tomatoes I am growing this year:

• Costoluto Genovese
• Isis Candy
• Carbon
• Perssimon
• Garden Peach
• God Love
• Cuostralee
• Bloody Butcher (No Fruit)
• Dona
• Golden Pearl
• Drazuba (No Fruit)
• Vintage Wine (crop failure)
• Ananas Noir
• Mirabelle Blanche
• Tonadose des Conores
• Hungarian Heart
• Paul Robeson
• Clemintine
• Rouge D’Irak (yes, that Iraq)
• Homesweet
• Mexican Honey (Too damn lazy to write up a tasting before the end of the season)

BTW, if you have an opinion about a tomato that differs from mine, please post it. Tomatoes are much like wine. Everybody likes and dislikes things for different reasons. I promise, I will not be offended if you think a tomato I like is just the worst thing you ever tried.

So let the 2007 Hanna’s Tomato Tastings begin. If you are so inclined, you can review Hanna’s Tomato Tastings 2006.

My tomatoes are (finally) ripening and I have been feasting on many, many tomatoes in the past week or so.

Since there are hundreds of varieties of tomatoes, both heirloom and hybrid, to grow in the garden, one frequently has to rely on the advice and reviews of other gardeners to decide which tomatoes you will plant in your garden in the upcoming year. It is either that, or settle for the same old tomatoes you grow every year and spend a whole year wondering what delicious gem you are missing out on. Personally, I think wondering about what could have been better just sucks, but that is just me.

Even if you have you favorites, I would recommend that everyone try at least one new tomato in their garden each year. Biodiversity is important to both the planet and for the holy quest for the perfect tomato.

This year, I planted 16 different varieties of heirloom tomatoes. These varieties were:

• 1884
• Azoychka
• Big Rainbow
• Black Ethiopian
• Black Plum
• Black Zebra (Crop Failure)
• Carmello (No viable fruit due to early frost)
• Goose Creek
• Green Pineapple (No viable fruit due to early frost)
• Hawaiian Pineapple
• Marianna’s Peace
• Opalka (Crop Failure)
• Peacevine Crazy Cherry
• Sara Black
• Thai Pink
• White Beauty

Bonus Tastings

• Health Kick or Healthy Choice (From Neighbor Maxine)
• Enormous Plum (um… I think I got a different tomato than what I ordered but it was marked correctly)

So to help both my memory and your possible selections for next year, I am going to do a review of each tomato type. As I finish a review, I will link from this page to the review.

If you have grown a tomato on this list and have written your own review, simply leave a comment containing the URL of the tasting on the post about that tomato. As always, you can simply chime in within the comment your thoughts on that tomato.

If you would like to review a tomato that is not on this page, then leave a comment here with the name of the tomato variety and either the URL to the review on your site or just your thoughts on it.

BTW, if you have an opinion about a tomato that differs from mine, please post it. Tomatoes are much like wine. Everybody likes and dislikes things for different reasons. I promise, I will not be offended if you think a tomato I like is just the worst thing you ever tried.

So, here we go. Hanna’s Tomato Tastings 2006 is about to begin.

Part of Hanna’s Tomato Tastings 2007

I bought this seed because I had just never grown an oxheart tomato. These big beefy tomatoes get lots of rave reviews and I thought it was time I tried one.

The description from the company I bought it from reads:

Oxheart tomatoes have been popular for generations because of their excellently flavored, meaty, large tomatoes that provide lots of solid good eating with very few seeds. The fruit of Hungarian Heart follows suit, with large, pink heart-shaped tomatoes that become 1 lb. and are just luscious. As a bonus, these plants are not shy bearers, but rather quite productive for an oxheart type. Hungarian heirloom. Indeterminate. 70 days

The Beauty Pageant:

Size: Anywhere from a pound to a half pound.

Shape: Very much like a mammal heart. It is a little creepy. One interesting note is that these tomatoes seem prone to fasciation. I had three tomatoes come off this plant that were actually two tomatoes fused together

The inside: Very meaty. Medium walls but very thick cores. There is two chambers (on a normal one) with some seeds. The seeds are large. The gel is pretty tight.

Texture: A soft mealy texture.

Tasting:

Off the Vine Tasting: Tangy and tomatoey. The gel is much tangier than the meat.

Sliced and Salted Tasting: Salt just rocks this tomato. I was not all that thrilled with the taste but adding salt makes this a darn good tomato.

Cooking Thoughts: I am thinking that this would be best for sauce because you could salt it and take advantage of that turn up of the tomato volume.

Growing Notes:
Good size plant. It is prolific but the fasciation even just the lumpy general shape of the tomato causes some problems. The little nooks and crannies seem to be convenient little hiding places for bugs and spider egg sacs. Healthy plant other than that.

Will Hanna grow this one again:
Maybe. While salted it is pretty good, for a tomato this size, I would prefer a beefsteak. Of course this is just my first oxheart tomato. There may be even better ones out there.

Part of Hanna’s Tomato Tastings 2007

This was another freebie tomato so I have no comments as to why I bought this. Just ended up here by dumb luck.

To kind of add a little salt to this, these seeds were freebies with some seeds I bought off eBay to grow. The seeds all grew, but I managed to kill all the plants except for this one, which was one I never intended to buy in the first place. Life is funny.

The description from the company I bought it from reads:

This special home gardener variety was bred for great tasting fruits. The large, nine ounce red fruits have a well-balanced floor and are produced in abundance on determinate plants that do not require staking. This variety retains the vigor of its hybrid parents along with some disease resistant and terrific yields. Wide adaptability makes this variety a great choice for gardeners throughout the country.

The Beauty Pageant:

Size: A bit smaller than a baseball.

Shape: Round but a bit lopsided.

The inside: Thick walls, pretty loose gel and the seeds are on the largish side. Thick core too.

Texture: A tad mealy, but not bad. Very juicy.

Tasting:

Off the Vine Tasting: Tangy. Full of tomato flavor and not sweet at all.

Sliced and Salted Tasting: Salt turns down the tanginess on this tomato, which is not really good since that is the main thing it had going for it. Leave it more bland than it was.

Cooking Thoughts: Good for sauces. The seeds just slip right out. Probably good for salsas as well, but I would de-seed so that your salsa would not be as watery.

Growing Notes:
This is a medium size plant. The description says it doesn’t need staking, but mine is wobbly enough that I am glad I have it on strings. The tomatoes did crack some in the massive amount of rain that we had a few weeks back but they were small cracks that healed themselves after the rain.

Will Hanna grow this one again:
Probably not. Not a bad tomato, just not a stand out one. I certainly wouldn’t turn it down if someone gave them to me (again) but I have others I would choose ahead of it.

Part of Hanna’s Tomato Tastings 2007

I don’t recall how this tomato ended up in my cart when I was shopping for seeds. It may very well have been an accident. I suspect that the fact that it was labled a “dark” tomato had something to do with it, though the picture on the sellers site does not look dark at all.

The description from the company I bought it from reads:

Our most exciting new tomato this year, it is wonderful in every way. This unusual variety was developed by Pascal Moreau, a horticulturist from Belgium. The multi-colored, smooth fruit (green, yellow and purple mix) weigh about 1 1/2 lbs. The flesh is bright green with deep red streaks. Everyone loves their superb flavor that is outstanding, being both sweet and smoky with a hint of citrus. The yield is one of the heaviest we have ever seen! Be the first at your farmers market to have this new classic.

The Beauty Pageant:

Size: The one picture is medium size but the other that have come off the plant have been larger than this one. Somewhere between baseball size and two fist size.

Shape: Round but a little on the lopsided side. The larger they are, the more lopsided they become.

The inside: Medium walls, thick core. There are several chambers inside. This inside is striated with red and green, with some white. The gel is loose which makes this a rather sloppy tomato.

Texture: Smooth.

Tasting:

Off the Vine Tasting: Very, very, very sweet. This is sweeter than any cherry tomato I have ever tried. Not much tomato flavor, just sweet.

Sliced and Salted Tasting: The sweet flavor is turned down some, but not much with salt added. The salt does bring back some tomato flavor.

Cooking Thoughts: As I am not a big fan of sweet tomatoes I can’t think of much that I would want to cook with these. They are candy sweet. Maybe as a side dish? This would be a fantastic tomato to grow if you have a child who is not fond of tomatoes. The sweet flavor would introduce them gently to tomatoes.

Growing Notes:
Medium size plant. While I harvested a few tomatoes off this plant, this is the first one that I have been able to eat. These tomatoes rot incredibly fast, I suspect the high sugar content has something to do with that. Also, the seller had a picture of a near fluorescent green tomato with red striations. Not one of mine has had such coloration.

Will Hanna grow this one again:
I won’t but I don’t like overly sweet tomatoes. If you do like sweet tomatoes, than I would highly recommend this one. I have never tasted one that is sweeter.

Part of Hanna’s Tomato Tastings 2007

I have come to think of this as the pool boy of my tomato garden. The only reason it is there is because it improves the visible landscape. Handsome and exotic looking, even it’s name, Custoluto Genovese, brings to mind tall, well formed, shirtless men with burning and only slightly vapid eyes. And much like a pool boy, chances are it serves very little purpose elsewhere and the husband doesn’t like it. *sigh* At least it looks nice.

I saw this for the first time on You Grow Girl when Gayla posted a picture of a group of tomatoes and there was a few Costoluto Genovese in the group. I had to have it but I am now a bit worried about my rash, lust driven decision. Joey Ballgaggio left a comment declaring that these had literally made him vomit. Hmm… I just want to point out what risks I take in bringing you guys these Tomato Tastings.

The description from the company I bought it from reads:

Italian heirloom tomatoes. Large, deep-red, juicy tomatoes are deeply ribbed but fully flavored and absolutely delicious. This variety is hearty and does well in hot weather, but continues to produce even when the weather turns cool. Indeterminate, 78 days.

The Beauty Pageant:

Size: Smallish. It is smaller than the palm area of my hand but not by too much.

Shape: Broad shoulders, chiseled lobes… um… pool boy… Anyway, flattish as well. The tomato has two distinct sides and is cinched where the two sides meet in the middle.

The inside: As mentioned, there seems to be two sides. It is almost like a Siamese twin. Each side has a chamber with each chamber having its own core. The gel is loose and the seeds are small.

Texture: It is a soft mealy. It not so much grainy like most mealy tomato but still a bumpy feeling.

Tasting:

Off the Vine Tasting: Okay, barf bag is still empty. This is a strongly flavored tomato. Like smack you in the face tomato flavor. There is nothing sweet about it. Not terrible off the vine but not really good either.

Sliced and Salted Tasting: From a raw stand point, salt does not do this tomato any favors. The already overly strong flavor is just cranked up even more.

Cooking Thoughts: You can’t slice this well and the strong flavor is a bit too much already. Your best bet is to sauce these. The nice thing is that these puppies will stretch a whole lot further than normal tomatoes. These can take watering down and will stand up well to whatever flavoring you like in your tomato.

Growing Notes:
This plant is a pretty good size. Not too bushy though. The problem I have with it is that the fruit are just not ripening. Despite the fact that these tomatoes were among the first tomatoes to bear fruit, I have only harvested two to his date. The plant is full of very green tomatoes. I am guessing that because this is a hot weather tomato and this has been a somewhat cool summer, the tomatoes just are not liking this climate.

Will Hanna grow this one again:
No. The nice thing about pool boys is that they are a dime a dozen. Great for a summer fling but when you are looking for long term tomato love, you need to find something with a little more substance.

Part of Hanna’s Tomato Tastings 2007

I bought the carbon tomato simply because it was a yummy looking black tomato. I am a big fan of black and purple tomatoes and always on the lookout for new favorites in this area.

The description from the company I bought it from reads:

Supposedly one of the darkest of the “black” tomatoes. Its flavor is exceptionally rich yet sweet and the essence of delicious summer tomato flavor. Medium to large, 8 to 12 oz. tomatoes are flattened round and smooth, without the cracking or blemishing that seems to plague some black tomatoes. They are dark purplish-brown on the outside with a deep brick-red interior. Indeterminate, 80 days

The Beauty Pageant:

Size: Medium size. Just a little wider than a baseball and about half the height of a baseball.

Shape: Squat but shapely. Even my husband commented that it was a nice looking tomato. Smooth sides and very presentable.

The inside: Good, meaty core with this walls. Due to the size of the core, there is just slivers for the seed chambers, so there is not much in the way of seeds. Gel is pretty tight so there is not much juice running out when sliced.

Texture: It is not mealy but it is not smooth either. It almost has a slightly stringy texture.

Tasting:

Off the Vine Tasting: Oh yeah. This has that nice black tomato flavor I love. The is nothing sweet about this tomato but it is not tangy or sour either. It is certainly smoky flavored. Almost meat like but just a tad tangier. After you have swallowed a bite, the aftertaste is exactly like the aftertaste of beef.

Sliced and Salted Tasting: Salt does not seem to do much to the flavor of this tomato. It intensifies it some, but not significantly.

Cooking Thoughts: Good flavor, it holds up well when sliced and only has a few seeds. I thinking that this is an excellent everything tomato. Use it for sauce, sides dishes, appetizers or on sandwiches.

Growing Notes:
It is growing well. Decent size plant. There are lots of little green tomatoes but the pictured tomato is the only one that has ripened or shows any signs of even thinking about ripening. At this point in time in the year, my big concern is that the first frost will happen before they ripen.

Will Hanna grow this one again:
I really would like to. But if we get frost before the other tomatoes ripen than this tomato will just not be an option for the future. I can’t grow tomatoes that will only produce one good fruit in a season.

Part of Hanna’s Tomato Tastings 2007

So this is the infamous Paul Robeson tomato the heirloom lovers every where rave about. All you hear is Paul Robeson this and Paul Robeson that. I am feeling like if there was a tomato that would have paparazzi, this would be it. I am looking forward to trying this. I hope it lives up to the hype.

The description from the company I bought it from reads:

This famous tomato has almost a cult following among seed collectors and tomato connoisseurs. They simply cannot get enough of this variety’s amazing flavor that is so distinctive, sweet and smokey. 7-10 oz. fruit are a black-brick color. Named in honor of the famous opera singer star of ‘King Solomon’s Mines’, 1937. Paul Robeson was also a Russian and Equal Rights Advocate for Blacks. This Russian heirloom was lovingly named in his honor. We are proud to offer such a wonderful variety.

The Beauty Pageant:

Size: Medium size. A bit smaller than a baseball.

Shape: Round but not perfectly so. It looks almost like it had been a bit battered with a side a bit to flat or another side a bit too bulged. As you can see in the picture, the tomato is not crack resistant. (For anyone who cares, I am cooking up a huge batch of sauce tonight to make use of all my cracked tomatoes!)

The inside: Very wet and loose. There are several chambers inside with seeds in them and the multiple chamber walls mean that there is plenty of meat to these.

Texture: Not mealy but not as smooth as other tomatoes I have had..

Tasting:

Off the Vine Tasting: The gel has a good strong tangy tomato flavor and the meat is just a little sweet. The meat and skin near the green shoulders (which help to give it the purple color) is a bit on the bitter side.

Sliced and Salted Tasting: The tanginess goes completely away with salt and this becomes a rather sweet tasting tomato.

Cooking Thoughts: This tomato’s gel is too loose to serve as a side dish, though the flavor makes it a good candidate for that. Probably would make a nice bruschetta as the bread would soak up all the nice, juicy tomato flavor.

Growing Notes:
We have had an enormous amount of rain in the past week and a half so I can’t say how this tomato would do under normal conditions in regards to cracking. The plant is healthy and medium sized. Not too many fruit on it though. I am having a hard time deciding when these are ripe. Black and purple tomatoes get more and less dark depending on their growing conditions. This year all of my “black” tomatoes have come out looking half green rather than black due to conditions. I am constantly having to perform squeeze tests to decide if they are ripe.

Will Hanna grow this one again:
Maybe. It is kind of like the third movie in the summer blockbuster threequals that are so popular these days. That third movie is always “okay”. Not as good as the first, maybe better than the second was and is not a waste of your time and money but… you still remember that you have seen better before it.

Part of Hanna’s Tomato Tastings 2007

Well, there is no denying why I bought these tomato seeds. We are at war with… no… in… no… around… Aw hell, I don’t know. Some kind of badness is going on in Iraq and it has a cousin and a few friends wrapped up in it. Not to mention a whole darn country that has not seen a good period of peace since shortly after the times when it’s capital was the mecca of learning and trade. I do feel for the Iraqis. Most of them just want to live their lives and the every day fact of war works against the whole living part of that equation. And no matter how you slice it, for good or bad, we Americans are contributing to it. It may sound silly, but since there is nothing I can do to help those people, I thought the least I could do was try their tomatoes.

The seller claimed that these tomatoes were endangered due to the fact that Iraqi farmers are not allowed to buy any seeds but the seeds sold by American companies. So maybe that is the way it is and maybe it is not. I honestly don’t know if tat is true. It could be either way. But what ever it is, the story makes for something intriguing to tell.

The description from the company I bought it from reads:

Medium-sized fruit are finely flavored; good yields, too. This variety is endangered even in its own country, where saving seeds was made illegal under the “Colonial Powers” of the United States. Under the new law, Iraqi farmers must only plant seeds from “protected varieties” from international corporations. Is this our unique way of making democracy?

Just a side note, but this seed is no longer sold at this company.

The Beauty Pageant:

Size: Medium size. A bit smaller than a baseball. (forgot to put the quarter in the pic)

Shape: Round but not store bought round. Just a little too squat to be perfect. You will also notice in the picture that they are cracked. The had started to crack even before the torrential rain we got this past week. These do not resist cracking at all.

The inside: This is a sloppy tomato. Juicy and runny gel. The seeds are on the large side. The walls are of a medium thickness and literally fall away from the gel and seeds when cut.

Texture: Just a tad mealy. Not terrible, but not as smooth as it could be. The large seeds do get lodged in my back teeth.

Tasting:

Off the Vine Tasting: This is not a stand out tomato but having said that, it is not a bad tomato. The meat is a little on the sweet side and the gel is a bit on the tangy side and then you just have tomato flavor. Definitely better than store bought but this tomato will not win any awards.

Sliced and Salted Tasting: Much sweeter with salt. Not much changes except for that.

Cooking Thoughts: This would be dead easy to deseed and the sweet flavor is nice for a sauce. This is not a sandwich tomato or a side dish tomato. It just falls apart too easy.

Growing Notes:
As mentioned, this tomato seems highly susceptible to cracking. This is not surprising since Iraq is mostly hot and dry and this would not be a concern in that environment. Pretty healthy plant. Medium size. Not overly prolific yet but it has produced a decent amount of tomatoes.

Will Hanna grow this one again:
Probably not. Cool back story, I will give it that but if I didn’t know this was an Iraqi tomato, I would not be impressed.

Bonus Note:
Patrick over at Bifurcated Carrots wrote a rather moving piece on Iraq, heirloom vegetable and modern governement. If you have a moment, you really should take the time to read it.

Part of Hanna’s Tomato Tastings 2007

These were the tomatoes that lead me to a life of crime. They had to be shipped not once, but twice because apparently gourmet French cherry tomatoes are a danger to National Security and the original package sent from the UK was confiscated at the border.

I wanted to try these after Rebsie at Daughter of the Soil posted about them. They just looked magical. And she had such a high opinion of them, I figured what could go wrong? How was I supposed to know that NOWHERE in the U.S. are these puppies sold. So Hanna had to go breakin’ the law, breakin’ the law to get some.

The description from the company I bought it from reads:

Yellow-orange tomato the size of a small plum. The sourish taste reminds one of citrus fruit. 48 seeds

The Beauty Pageant:

Size: These are the size of marbles. To tell the truth, I was surprised. The description from the company said “small plums”. Either the translation from the Queen’s English to US English was a bit wonky or the woman who wrote the description has a husband with a serious ”performance” issue that she is blissfully unaware of.

Shape: Round. Cute little round balls.

The inside: These are a nice golden color with tiny little seeds inside. The walls are thing but in a tomato this small, what can you expect. The really pretty thing about these though are the fact that they are translucent. You can make out the veining within the tomato and if you hold it up to the light, you can make out the seed chambers inside. What this does is makes the tomato almost seem to glow. Outside, in the right light, I swear they look like little lights on the tomato plant.

Texture: A little on the seedy side. It is hard not to be like that when the tomato is this small.

Tasting:

Off the Vine Tasting: Definitely citrusy. The gel is on the sour side but once that flavor passes, the meat is sugar sweet.

Sliced and Salted Tasting: Salt almost completely eliminates the sourness of the gel. You are left with a pleasing orangey sweet flavor with a nice background of tomato flavor.

Cooking Thoughts: No doubt that these are salad tomatoes. Not just salad tomatoes but gourmet salad tomatoes. A salad with some kind of salty cheese in it to really highlight the nice flavor. Not to mention that they would just look fabulous.

Growing Notes:
Prolific is an understatement with this tomato. The tomatoes grow in big, almost flower like clusters. There are probably around 2 dozen to a cluster. The plant is healthy and about 5 feet tall. No problems and is doing surprisingly well considering that the two plants next to it have died of wilt.

Will Hanna grow this one again:
Distinct possibility. It is a little smaller than I like, but it does taste nice (for a cherry) and looks damn pretty. At the very least I will be collecting seeds for trading. Since this is not available here in the US (as far as I could find), anyone who would like some, please feel free to contact me and I will send you some seeds. No trade or SASE required.