[korney19]

Here! You decide! some are other people's comments, list is mostly in alphabetical order. I've included some excellent heart varieties too. Some listed are great canners as well:

BISIGNANO #2--70 DAYS--Large spreading Indet. vine, to 14 oz. prolific, variable shape,(globe to plum) on same plant. Great flavor, juicy and seedy, a great all purpose tomato. Sturdy, rampant vines, set out four different fruit shapes; oval, globes, plums, and large heart shapes. All are thick walled and meaty, deep orange-red with full, rich tomato flavor. One of the best processing types you'll ever find. From Italy at least 30 years ago, via Mr. Bisignano (finalist in Victory Garden TV contest of 1984) for whom the tomato named.

"BLOCKY" MARZANO---70-80 DAYS--INDET. San Marzano type plants, seeds originally from El Salvador. Most fruits are red, lobed or ribbed like a bell pepper, but still a plum shape like the original San Marzano, about 3 inches long by up to 2 inches wide/square, in clusters of 4 to 8 or so.

BUTTER AND BULL HEART*--75-80 DAYS--Nice, 3-4" pink, heart-shaped fruits, almost coming to a rounded point on the bottom on many; very good flavor; a good tomato for canning or slicing. Originally from Jenny Virsnieks, a Latvian immigrant now living in ★★★★★★★★ City, WI.

ERNIE'S PLUMP--75-80 DAYS--Cooks down to the the reddest, richest, flavorful sauce ever! 8 -12oz. fruits are a most unique shape: "plump" double pears with a tiny blossom scar, almost a wide bell-shaped. Rich beyond words. Extreme producer.

HEIDI--75 DAYS--Medium sized INDET. plant that bears thick walled paste type fruits with tender skin. Originated in Cameroon. 2.5" pear shape, red paste fruit, rich tomato flavor, high yields.

HERMAN'S YELLOW--75-80 DAYS--Droopy foliage type INDET. Golden to pale orange heart shaped, with intense but balanced flavor, with slight hints of citrus; 12-16oz or more.

HORVATH--75-80 DAYS--Perhaps my biggest surprise in cooking-type tomatoes. The plant was grown in a 4 gallon bucket (maybe 3/4ths full) with drip irrigation and put out huge, blocky, pointy plums, some 6 inches long by 3 inches wide. Very few seeds inside. Very meaty and solid. Great for sauce or canning. Family heirloom of the Horvath Family, Edison, NJ, original seed from an area in Italy on the Adriatic Sea.

JOE'S PLUM--75-85 DAYS--Indet. Huge red 8-12oz. plums with solid flesh, not many seeds and sweet rich flavor. Plants produce high yields. Big (up to 4x5"), blocky, red, very meaty fruits; great for canning but I loved them fresh. Originally from Charles Daidone, NJ, who got seeds from a gardener named Joe who got seeds from Italy.

KALMAN'S HUNGARIAN PINK*--77-82 DAYS--INDET. Hungarian heirloom imported by Kalman Lajvort of Edison, N.J. 8-10oz for me using drip fertigation. Outstanding flavor & production; somewhat barrel or plum shaped pinks.

KHIRHIV--75 DAYS--Indet. A large elongated plum shaped red with great flavor. Can be used fresh, for sauce, or canned.

KORNEY'S CROSS F6-T--65-70 DAYS--An intentional cross between a determinate rugose leaf red beefsteak pollinated by Black Plum; F5 seed produced 2 different versions, this one is a 2-2.5"+ brown/mahogany slightly plum-shaped fruit. This version is slightly taller than it is wide, more plum shaped, and slightly more solid than KORNEY'S CROSS F6-W. Thick walls, tangy acidic flavor, great for salsa or whole canning. Stays on plant well, keeps on counter for a while.

MARTINO'S ROMA--75-80 DAYS--DET. Rugose leaf. Great flavored heavy yielder of 2-3 oz Red plum/pear type fruit, possibly the highest yielding of all the Roma types. 3 in. long. These paste-type fruit are meaty with few seeds and almost no juice, perfect for cooking, salsa, etc. Compact determinate plants.

ORANGE BANANA*--85 DAYS--Indet. Orange Banana was the clear winner of an autumn paste taste at the Shipmans in Maine. Sweet flavor of Sungold but with more depth, makes a great sauce by itself, or adds a fruity complexity to other sauces. Orange fruits 3-4" long avg 4-5 oz.

POWER'S HEIRLOOM--80 DAYS--INDET. Clear yellow large paste type plum tomato, 4-7 oz. usually 3½" long with a slight point on the blossom end. Very productive and pretty. Sweet, juicy. Heavy set of light yellow fruits with pale yellow almost white flesh.

PRUE--80-85 DAYS--INDET. Wispy almost floppy leaved plant. The tomato of Mr. Henry Prue, an old timer born at the turn of the century who started gardening back in the 20’s-30’s. Somewhere between plum and heart shaped, very meaty, can vary in size from 3” wide at the top and 4” long with a nipple, to being 4” wide and 5” long. About 5-12oz though some bigger, occasionally hitting a pound or more. Prue starts turning a pinkish/red in a variegated pattern and parts are green while other parts are getting red--at first uneven ripening at early stages, though it ends up solid red. Sometimes thought to resemble a “Charley Brown Christmas tree" with scrawny sparse leaves that often look twisted or flopping over! It's taste is very good, quite different from many other reds, a somewhat earthy taste, not all that sweet, the essence of what tomatoey would be, all sorts of tastes linger on the tongue after you've taken a mouthful.

RIO GRANDE--75 DAYS--Determinate. Rugose-leaved, compact growth. Seems very disease resistant - A super canner, out produces anything I have seen. Fruit larger & twice as much as Roma. Giant plum shaped to globe shaped. Expect 4 quarts of sauce per plant. NOTE: MINE CONTINUOUSLY TOPPLE THE CHEAP 3-RING HARDWARE STORE CAGES.

ROSALIE'S PASTE*--80 DAYS--INDET. A large bright red heart shaped paste. Meaty with nice flavor. Heavy production. 3 x 4-inch, pointed. A great sauce tomato. Good concentrated flavors. Juicy enough to make a good slicer too.

RUSSIAN 117--80-85 DAYS--Large red heart-shaped fruit is often doubled like side-by-side hearts, up to 1 lb. or more. Great taste, solid dense meat and not many seeds. More productive than the typical oxheart types.

SLANKARD'S*--75-85 DAYS--Large pink blocky hearts, many 1lb or more, quite productive, mild, meaty. Large (4-5"), very few seeds; great flavor; excellent canner. Family heirloom Michael Byrne of MI.

SOJOURNER SOUTH AMERICAN*--80-55 DAYS--INDET. regular leaf. Large to very large blocky plum shaped fruit. Extremely heavy for its size! Bright red with excellent, wonderfully sweet flavor. Said to keep setting fruit in 100° weather and drought. Sometimes a bit slow to fully ripen but you WILL be rewarded. NOTE: THIS WAS A GREAT SURPRISE, SWEET & MEATY, PLUS STILL A LITTLE JUICY, MOST 3½-4" X 2½-3"W. EARLIER THAN CLAIMED.

SPECKLED ROMAN--75 DAYS--Up to 5x3" tapered red fruits with stunning wavy golden orange stripes; fruits meaty and with excellent flavor; very productive.

TEN FINGERS of NAPLES ( Dix Doights De Naples )*--Clusters of elongated plum tomatoes! Heavy yields on tall vines produce plenty of fruits in bunches of 4 to 8 or more, lots of elongate little blocky bright red paste tomatoes. Firm meaty tomatoes with little seeds, excellent tomato for cooking, paste, puree, etc.

UKRAINIAN HEART--75-80 DAYS--A "Huge" surprise for me! These were large to very large pinks, almost triangular wedges, one of the best tasting varieties I grew this past season. Large pink, 5", round fruit, high shoulders, flat sides, sweet flavor, to 1.5 lbs.

UNCLE STEVE'S*--70-80 DAYS--Italian plum of Steve Messina, 6oz and up plum type tomato, nice and meaty, great for cooking, and sauce, juicy enough to eat fresh too. Mine were HUGE blocky plums, some 5-6 inches long and over 3 inches wide when grown in a 4 gallon bucket with drip irrigation! Uncle Steve's, Horvath, and Yugoslavian were my biggest "cooking tomato" surprises of the season.

WAGNER'S ITALIAN--70-80 DAYS--Indet. Deep pink elongated/pointed plum shaped paste tomato. This was beautifully aromatic, tasty and sweet, good enough to eat fresh. Very rare for a plum/paste type, since most are red and really dry--Wagner's was juicy enough for fresh eating, or in salads, and a beautiful deep pink color.

WES*--75-80 DAYS--INDET. Wispy oxheart type foliage. Large heart shaped red fruits, often with blunt bottoms (no points) and some almost huge doubles. Great flavor; cut it open and smell the intense aroma; not many seeds. A great tomato!

YUGOSLAVIAN--75-80 DAYS--A great yet unusual tomato. Deep pink almost plum-shaped to pear-shaped fruits, some doubles, produced all season for me. Wonderful aroma when cut open, and great taste too! A slight bit of hollowness on some, but juicier than a paste type tomato. 4-6oz fruits about 2½ inches by 3 inches, the doubles were up to 4 inches wide. Was great, my favorite sliced on white pizza all season long.

Roughwood Golden Plum--Indet. Potato Leaf. Orange fruits resemble 2 plum tomatoes grown together; was a stable F9 cross of Yellow Brandywine x San Marzano. up to 5oz.

Sarnowski Polish Plum--4-6 oz. mostly plum-shaped red paste type tomatoes on sprawling vines. Good flavor and yield. Family heirloom brought to NY from Poland in 1890s. Indeterminate.

Wuhib--3" long 3-chambered dry, meaty paste tomato on semi-determinate 3½' vines; quite productive and somewhat larger than San Marzano, but more difficult to prepare for drying due to odd number of chambers. NY MA C 96 From Tadessee Wuhib of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.