My 2012 tomato reviews & pics

Cole_Robbie · September 6, 2012

I built a 14x48 poly hoop house over the winter and raised bedding plants to sell at the farmer’s market and to plant in my family’s gardens. We have gardened all my life and my grandparents have been successful market vendors for 35 years. But despite all of that, I never had any idea just how many different varieties of tomatoes exist. I am still a newbie in regard to being a connoisseur of heirlooms like a lot of people on this site.

I’m in Illinois zone 6, and my soil is largely unimproved clay. For container mix, I used two different pro mixes. The first was mostly pine bark fines, and the other was mostly peat. To the pro-mix, I added compost made from shrimp shells. For fertilizer, I used osmocote. I also fertilized when watering with a variety of other ferts, like molasses, bat guano, Alaskan fish, greensand. I still use chemical ferts to water container plants on occasion, but not very often. The in-ground plants got osmocote and greensand in the hole. I tried to fertigate, but had trouble getting the injector to work, so my “fertigation” was dumping buckets by hand. I bought the 'tomato fertilizer pack’ from Morgan County Seeds. It’s two part. One is 4-18-38. The other is Calcium Nitrate. They say to alternate each week, and I had good results with that.

Early Girl - The most popular tomato in my area, and the easiest plant to sell, because everyone knows the name. I know of a neighboring greenhouse owner who only grows this one variety. I was wary of what the taste would be like when grown in containers, so I only grew one big plant in a 5-gallon bucket. They were excellent, and I had bright red, vine-ripened tomatoes by the first week of May. I am going to put as many as I can fit into the greenhouse for next spring. Early Girl will be an 'always have’ in my garden. The one criticism I have is that the tomatoes are small. It seems to go berserk setting new fruit, and there are just too many for them to get big.

Bush Early Girl - I could not tell much of a difference. I had two of these in 2-gallon pots. They set fewer fruit, but the fruit was bigger. I won’t bother with this one again.

Early Doll - It attempts to compete with Early Girl by advertising a lower number of days to maturity. I had all my early plants together, and the Early Girl outperformed them all. Early Doll was a smaller plant and had small egg-shaped fruit. Waste of time.

Early Treat - same as Early Doll. It’s a wanna-be Early Girl that isn’t and another 'never again’ for me.

Goliath - The plant grows like a weed, and people buying plants like the name. I just don’t like the flavor of the tomato, though. I had some splitting, but the lack of flavor alone was enough for me to not want to grow this one again.

Container’s Choice & Patio f1 - I’m going to lump these two together, because the plants looked exactly the same to me. They grow in a squat, compact, thick-stemmed fashion that plant-buyers love. They look very different from other seedlings. I kind of wonder if they got treated with some sort of growth hormone? I sold a ton of these plants, and thankfully I kept one Container’s Choice to grow for myself. It was a picture-perfect plant in a 2-gallon container with a tremendous amount of big and pretty tomatoes. It was too good to be true, though, as the taste of the tomatoes was absolutely disgusting. It was tasteless, mealy mush. Even though they are great sellers, I won’t order these again.

Tumbling Tom & Tumbler - two other varieties that I can’t tell apart. They look beautiful in hanging baskets, simply as flowering plants. They bloom profusely. Unfortunately, I don’t like the tomatoes they produce. They are not nearly as bad as the container’s choice, but the marble-sized fruit is just skin and juice. I could see some people liking the taste, and because they are so well-suited to hanging baskets, I will order these again.

Terrenzo - this is my pick for a container tomato. I had them in hanging baskets, and they are not well-suited to a container that small. Next year, I will put them in at least 2-gallon pots. Terrenzo is the only container tomato I had that I actually liked to eat. I will order these again

Bitonto - this one is my “mini” pick. I could fit two of them in a 6x12 planter and they did not seem to want more space. I did not try the cherry fruit it produces, but friends I gave plants to told me it was agreeable. These were good sellers, and I will order again.

here's a bitonto going into a planter:

Tiny Tim - another micro variety. I had a lot of seedlings, but it was at the very end of my spring season, and they got Early Blight badly enough for me to toss most of them. I liked Bitonto better, anyway.

Pink Brandywine - I ordered all my Brandywine seeds from Morgan County Seeds. Their wholesale source is Seeds by Design. For pink bw, it says “probably from the Ben Quisenberry collection.” Whatever it is, I like it a lot. It’s my favorite tomato, and next year I want to try every other type of pink bw I can get.

Black and Pink BW with a tomatillo:

Yellow Brandywine - Great flavor, somewhat less yield than the pink, but seemed to catch up later. I will definitely try this one again. I might try grafting it next spring. I read Carolyn post on here that “platfoot” yellow bw has less cat-facing. I will try that one, as some of my yellow bw fruit were too irregular to make sandwich slices.

Red Brandywine - I had the potato-leafed one that seeds by design sells. That’s all I know. It was my girlfriend’s favorite, but I think that’s because it was the only red heirloom I had, and she just likes red tomatoes. I will try a different red bw next year; I think I can do better.

Black Brandywine - Yuck! Why does this tomato exist when there is Cherokee Purple? It’s the only bw I don’t like. None of my family did, either. I won’t order again.

Mr Stripey - He is no friend of mine; this was my biggest waste of space. Maybe I don’t like striped tomatoes, but I won’t grow this one again. I got about four tomatoes that I had to share with the deer, who seem to pick out Mr. Stripey and Brandywine before they ate anything else.

Black Cherry - It seems like everybody likes this one except me. Maybe I just don’t like cherry tomatoes. I will still raise them to sell, though. The plants in my mom’s garden are eight foot tall giants. They look like landscaping hedges.

Cherokee Purple - a tough sell to people who are used to red tomatoes. I like it well enough to grow it again. It is a good conversation piece on a table of plants for sale.

Polbig - A decent-tasting tomato and good producer. Mine got bacterial speck, but that was probably my fault for letting the vines lay on the ground.

Sub-Artic Plenty - We had a brutal frost that killed all of our early plants except this one. Everything was covered in thick frost almost all night. I have no idea how this plant lived, but it did live up to it’s name. Otherwise, it is a very ordinary red tomato.

Pompeii Roma - I got the seeds at a Worm’s Way in Nashville, It is a horn-shaped heirloom. Yield was tremendous, as was the flavor of the sauce I made with it. This one is my pick for a sauce tomato, and I plan to order it every year.

Pompeii:

Pompeii's on the grill:

Beaver Lodge - this was my surprise hit. I had most of my yield from this variety. The taste is pretty good. It came out this year that the consistent-color gene modification is what makes modern hybrid tomatoes not be sweet; beaver lodge does not turn color evenly. The top stays a little green. I wonder if that relates to why the taste is good.

My list of new varieties I want to try next year:
Platfoot yellow brandywine
Every pink bw I can find: cowlick’s, otv, glick;s, sudduth’s, pawer’s
Lemon Boy
Big Beef
Estiva
Bella Rose
Brandy Boy
Mule Team
Carbon Copy
Celebrity
Ramapo
Liz Birt
Bear Creek
German Johnson
Purple Dog Creek
Barlow Jap
Giant Belgium

Here are more pics of the tomatoes I took to market:

September 6, 2012	#1
Cole_Robbie Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Jun 2012 Location: Illinois, zone 6 Posts: 8,407	My 2012 tomato reviews & pics I built a 14x48 poly hoop house over the winter and raised bedding plants to sell at the farmer’s market and to plant in my family’s gardens. We have gardened all my life and my grandparents have been successful market vendors for 35 years. But despite all of that, I never had any idea just how many different varieties of tomatoes exist. I am still a newbie in regard to being a connoisseur of heirlooms like a lot of people on this site. I’m in Illinois zone 6, and my soil is largely unimproved clay. For container mix, I used two different pro mixes. The first was mostly pine bark fines, and the other was mostly peat. To the pro-mix, I added compost made from shrimp shells. For fertilizer, I used osmocote. I also fertilized when watering with a variety of other ferts, like molasses, bat guano, Alaskan fish, greensand. I still use chemical ferts to water container plants on occasion, but not very often. The in-ground plants got osmocote and greensand in the hole. I tried to fertigate, but had trouble getting the injector to work, so my “fertigation” was dumping buckets by hand. I bought the 'tomato fertilizer pack’ from Morgan County Seeds. It’s two part. One is 4-18-38. The other is Calcium Nitrate. They say to alternate each week, and I had good results with that. Early Girl - The most popular tomato in my area, and the easiest plant to sell, because everyone knows the name. I know of a neighboring greenhouse owner who only grows this one variety. I was wary of what the taste would be like when grown in containers, so I only grew one big plant in a 5-gallon bucket. They were excellent, and I had bright red, vine-ripened tomatoes by the first week of May. I am going to put as many as I can fit into the greenhouse for next spring. Early Girl will be an 'always have’ in my garden. The one criticism I have is that the tomatoes are small. It seems to go berserk setting new fruit, and there are just too many for them to get big. Bush Early Girl - I could not tell much of a difference. I had two of these in 2-gallon pots. They set fewer fruit, but the fruit was bigger. I won’t bother with this one again. Early Doll - It attempts to compete with Early Girl by advertising a lower number of days to maturity. I had all my early plants together, and the Early Girl outperformed them all. Early Doll was a smaller plant and had small egg-shaped fruit. Waste of time. Early Treat - same as Early Doll. It’s a wanna-be Early Girl that isn’t and another 'never again’ for me. Goliath - The plant grows like a weed, and people buying plants like the name. I just don’t like the flavor of the tomato, though. I had some splitting, but the lack of flavor alone was enough for me to not want to grow this one again. Container’s Choice & Patio f1 - I’m going to lump these two together, because the plants looked exactly the same to me. They grow in a squat, compact, thick-stemmed fashion that plant-buyers love. They look very different from other seedlings. I kind of wonder if they got treated with some sort of growth hormone? I sold a ton of these plants, and thankfully I kept one Container’s Choice to grow for myself. It was a picture-perfect plant in a 2-gallon container with a tremendous amount of big and pretty tomatoes. It was too good to be true, though, as the taste of the tomatoes was absolutely disgusting. It was tasteless, mealy mush. Even though they are great sellers, I won’t order these again. Tumbling Tom & Tumbler - two other varieties that I can’t tell apart. They look beautiful in hanging baskets, simply as flowering plants. They bloom profusely. Unfortunately, I don’t like the tomatoes they produce. They are not nearly as bad as the container’s choice, but the marble-sized fruit is just skin and juice. I could see some people liking the taste, and because they are so well-suited to hanging baskets, I will order these again. Terrenzo - this is my pick for a container tomato. I had them in hanging baskets, and they are not well-suited to a container that small. Next year, I will put them in at least 2-gallon pots. Terrenzo is the only container tomato I had that I actually liked to eat. I will order these again Bitonto - this one is my “mini” pick. I could fit two of them in a 6x12 planter and they did not seem to want more space. I did not try the cherry fruit it produces, but friends I gave plants to told me it was agreeable. These were good sellers, and I will order again. here's a bitonto going into a planter: Tiny Tim - another micro variety. I had a lot of seedlings, but it was at the very end of my spring season, and they got Early Blight badly enough for me to toss most of them. I liked Bitonto better, anyway. Pink Brandywine - I ordered all my Brandywine seeds from Morgan County Seeds. Their wholesale source is Seeds by Design. For pink bw, it says “probably from the Ben Quisenberry collection.” Whatever it is, I like it a lot. It’s my favorite tomato, and next year I want to try every other type of pink bw I can get. Black and Pink BW with a tomatillo: Yellow Brandywine - Great flavor, somewhat less yield than the pink, but seemed to catch up later. I will definitely try this one again. I might try grafting it next spring. I read Carolyn post on here that “platfoot” yellow bw has less cat-facing. I will try that one, as some of my yellow bw fruit were too irregular to make sandwich slices. Red Brandywine - I had the potato-leafed one that seeds by design sells. That’s all I know. It was my girlfriend’s favorite, but I think that’s because it was the only red heirloom I had, and she just likes red tomatoes. I will try a different red bw next year; I think I can do better. Black Brandywine - Yuck! Why does this tomato exist when there is Cherokee Purple? It’s the only bw I don’t like. None of my family did, either. I won’t order again. Mr Stripey - He is no friend of mine; this was my biggest waste of space. Maybe I don’t like striped tomatoes, but I won’t grow this one again. I got about four tomatoes that I had to share with the deer, who seem to pick out Mr. Stripey and Brandywine before they ate anything else. Black Cherry - It seems like everybody likes this one except me. Maybe I just don’t like cherry tomatoes. I will still raise them to sell, though. The plants in my mom’s garden are eight foot tall giants. They look like landscaping hedges. Cherokee Purple - a tough sell to people who are used to red tomatoes. I like it well enough to grow it again. It is a good conversation piece on a table of plants for sale. Polbig - A decent-tasting tomato and good producer. Mine got bacterial speck, but that was probably my fault for letting the vines lay on the ground. Sub-Artic Plenty - We had a brutal frost that killed all of our early plants except this one. Everything was covered in thick frost almost all night. I have no idea how this plant lived, but it did live up to it’s name. Otherwise, it is a very ordinary red tomato. Pompeii Roma - I got the seeds at a Worm’s Way in Nashville, It is a horn-shaped heirloom. Yield was tremendous, as was the flavor of the sauce I made with it. This one is my pick for a sauce tomato, and I plan to order it every year. Pompeii: Pompeii's on the grill: Beaver Lodge - this was my surprise hit. I had most of my yield from this variety. The taste is pretty good. It came out this year that the consistent-color gene modification is what makes modern hybrid tomatoes not be sweet; beaver lodge does not turn color evenly. The top stays a little green. I wonder if that relates to why the taste is good. My list of new varieties I want to try next year: Platfoot yellow brandywine Every pink bw I can find: cowlick’s, otv, glick;s, sudduth’s, pawer’s Lemon Boy Big Beef Estiva Bella Rose Brandy Boy Mule Team Carbon Copy Celebrity Ramapo Liz Birt Bear Creek German Johnson Purple Dog Creek Barlow Jap Giant Belgium Here are more pics of the tomatoes I took to market: Last edited by Cole_Robbie; November 4, 2012 at 01:16 AM.