tomatoes with flavors all-their-own / unique tasting

I enjoy this thread. I've been thinking about growing tomatoes with unique flavors for the most part. Esmeralda Golosina and Prue sound pretty interesting. I personally think a lot of tomatoes *can* have a more unique flavor given the right conditions and soil.

[korney19]

Originally Posted by Barbee

There arent many tomatoes i have to spit out but Church was just nasty. I took it to the choptag tasting. Not only did i spit it in the trash can, but i had to wipe my tongue with a napkin! Tasted like dirt!

Barbee, how big did your Church fruits get?

[korney19]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

Salty tasting?

Smokey tasting?

Apparently I don't have either of those genes/alleles since I have never tasted same with any so called blacks,or otherwise with those traits.

Glad so many of you can do so, but not me.

Carolyn

Did you quit smoking yet? I did after 30+ years, but my taste buds must be permanently damaged...but I can smell a smoker within 6 feet!

[dirtdigging101]

Help,what is SNFLA and AGGs ?

thanks

Originally Posted by korney19

Did you quit smoking yet? I did after 30+ years, but my taste buds must be permanently damaged...but I can smell a smoker within 6 feet!

I quit three years ago after smoking for fifty six years. I had no idea how bad I smelled until I started smelling smokers as they approached. It doesn't bother me to be around smokers like it does some people, but I'm still surprised at how strong the odor is.

Ted

Originally Posted by dirtdigging101

Help,what is SNFLA and AGGs ?

thanks

SNFLA is an acronym for the Seek No Further Love Apple tomato. I'm not sure which tomato AGG is, off-hand (maybe Aunt Gertie's Gold, but I haven't been paying attention).

I tried my Seek No Further Love Apple tomatoes, by the way (and I found some bigger ones that I picked the other day, and a bigger Missouri Pink Love Apple, too). SNFLA tasted pretty good, but I was very happy to find it wasn't mealy or mushy (a lot of big tomatoes were). The taste of the SNFLAs was kind of unique, I suppose, but also a lot like a tomato I thought was a Brandywine tomato that I had in the fall of 2014 (although certainly it had unique differences). Missouri Pink Love Apple tasted more unique to me, but I think they're both great tomatoes.

I tried Chapman the other day, and wow, I was impressed. It tasted kind of like Pink Cheeks, in that it has that good taste for tuna sandwich tomatoes, but very much improved with something extra I hadn't tasted before, let alone in a large tomato. I mean, it practically already tastes like a tuna sandwich, all by itself. That might not sound totally flattering for a tomato, but it's really good. It wasn't mealy at all, either, and the fruits are huge (very, very wide, for huge sandwiches, if you're into those). They're shiny, too, and a very high percentage of the fruits are enormous. I prefer the flavor to George Detsikas Italian Red and Cuostralee (which had tomatoes of approximately the same size, give or take a little, but not as wide).

I finally got ripe Glacier tomatoes (which were probably an accidental cross). They're supposed to be early, but mine weren't. Anyway, they tasted really good, actually, and they had a blackberry-type smell to them (which affects the taste). I was so impressed with this aftertaste/smell that I put some sugar on it to see what it would taste like. It turns out that tomatoes (not just this kind) taste pretty good with sugar on them (and they taste like dessert), but this kind still had the blackberry-type smell with the sugar, while the others didn't. Now I want to make a sweet tomato pie, cobbler or something. I saved the seeds to plant again, because of the smell.

Disclaimer: Tomatoes taste different in my yard than other people's. I think it's the clay loam soil. I think it's usually an improved taste, unless the tomatoes are mealy (I probably watered many of the big ones too much for ideal texture/taste).

[korney19]

Originally Posted by tedln

I quit three years ago after smoking for fifty six years. I had no idea how bad I smelled until I started smelling smokers as they approached. It doesn't bother me to be around smokers like it does some people, but I'm still surprised at how strong the odor is.

Ted

Same here! I was smoking 2+ packs of Senecas...

[korney19]

Originally Posted by dirtdigging101

Help,what is SNFLA and AGGs ?

thanks

AGG = Aunt Gertie's Gold

[gorbelly]

Originally Posted by Gardeneer

Let me give you just one example .
Have you heard of something called "Bitter Melon"? Well, the name says it all. It is plain bitter. But the Asians and E.Indians eat it all the time and love it. I tried it couple of times (as recommended by an Asian how to prepare it. It was just bitter.

It's not just a taste for bitter melon specifically that is culturally acquired. It's that most Asian cuisines have an appreciation for bitterness in general as a valid and valued part of the taste spectrum, while many Western cuisines (there are some exceptions, such as Italian) do not. North American tastes, in particular, are very against bitterness of any kind.

These tastes are picked up fairly early in one's development, but some people are more flexible about it--I don't know why--and can change sensibilities later in life. Perhaps it has more to do with how determined one is. After all, most people are born hating the taste of coffee or alcohol, and the nature of these substances leads to most people not getting regular exposure to the taste as children, but because of how strong a role these beverages play in our culture, most of us continue to expose ourselves to it enough to develop an enjoyment and even enthusiasm for them.

Originally Posted by nancyruhl

The one I am sure I can identify by flavor blindfolded is Coyote. I love the sweet flavor with a totally different aftertaste, but I know some who don't.

Another vote for Coyote. I, too, love it.

Originally Posted by NarnianGarden

Coyote is definitely 'an aquired taste' In the beginning, I could not understand the attraction at all... bland and rotten
But the flavor changed and improved as the season progressed, and I really began to like it! Sweetness and complexity.
I still agree it's very unique and not everyone's cup of tea, probably ..

This aligns with my experience. I was very disappointed by early fruit. But flavor improved greatly later in the season. Also, I learned that I was picking it too early. Photos often show it being pale yellow or champagne-ish, but it didn't really achieve full flavor for me until the top half turned intense buttercup yellow.

I am puzzled by people who claim a "mushroomy" quality, though. To me, it has an aftertaste like corn. Of course, corn and mild mushrooms do share some similarities in aroma...

Originally Posted by oakley

Cilantro 'soap' has always fascinated me.

I'm a bit skeptical about the supposed genetic basis. Sure, there could be a genetic basis, but I doubt it defines entirely who likes and doesn't like cilantro. My brother hates cilantro because it tastes like soap to him. The first time I tasted cilantro, it tasted like soap to me, too. I had a roommate from California who cooked with it all the time, and my exposure to it coincided with my first real exposure to authentic Mexican cuisine. In short order, I grew to love it. It's possible that my brother and I have the same genetics for tasting the soapiness in cilantro, but I came to enjoy it and he did not because of our different experiences with it.

Originally Posted by carolyn137

Well,we all have Neanderthal DNA,that's well known.

Indigenous sub-Saharan African populations do not.

Originally Posted by Scooty

I also wonder if differences in taste perception are due use of specific descriptors, not just genes/alleles; where something like "salty" is more akin to savory or umami than like the normal-associated taste of table salt.

I think this is a good explanation. Black Beauty tastes umami to me, which gives the impression of a subtle saltiness.

[bbjm]

I've grown dozens of varieties (much less than many on this forum) and Wes and Prue are the best of the best -- in my opinion -- with Prue having the edge. Prue has always given good production even though it has a whispy and fragile-looking growing habit. But I grow it because it has a unique flavor that I find incredible. This year is all about taste for me. I am hardening off:
6 Wes
6 Prue
1 Dester
1 Earl's Faux
1 Brandywine Sudduth
1 Caspian Pink
1 Cherokee Purple
1 German Johnson
1 Sungold
1 Black Cherry.

Fingers crossed for a good season. Can't wait to get them in the ground.

Bret

Nice list Bret!

[bbjm]

Thank you. And apologies to the Forum. I did not mean to bump this old thread. LOL. I meant to post it in Venturabanana's more current thread about sweet-tart tomatoey varieties. But both are great threads to flip through for finding what people like.

Bret

[Scooty]

I started this thread mostly as a tangent to a post made by Tormato. This was strictly looking for unique tasting tomatoes (must be palatable).

After growing out Prue, I definitely think it occupies it's own space with respect to taste. I wouldn't necessarily think Wes does though, it's a good 'mater, but it's flavor profile (at least to me) overlaps with many others.

[DonDuck]

I like the old threads sometimes, I agree on Prue and Black Cherry, but KBX is also on my list.

[Scooty]

(To me at least), Black Cherry overlaps with so many other black/purple maters like Carbon Copy, Carbon, Black Krim, Dana's Dusky Rose, etc... all of which I enjoy, but not sure if there's uniqueness there just degrees of difference in intensity and subtle differences in flavors.

I'm on the fence with KBX. It's nearly identical as Kellogg's Breakfast, but not sure it counts as being unique or not-unique since it's a PL. On the other hand, I think it's close enough to Elbe and a few others.

It's hard to separate this thread for tomatoes everyone likes, but it was mostly searching to see if there was a "must try once" if only for a unique taste instead of a "top/favorite mater list."

If this thread was about voting for top/mater list, it'd probably reach one hundred varieties easy and keep on going lol.