Cherokee Purple & Black Krim!

[b54red]

Last year I grew both at the same time and only 3 feet apart. The Black Krim was far more productive and I actually did get that smokey flavor from a couple. They were both set out in early August and grew during the hottest driest fall I've ever seen down here so that may have impacted the Cherokee Purple's production and given the BK that wonderful flavor. The Black Krim was far better tasting but if you let it over ripen it would get somewhat mealy and the flavor would suffer.
This year I am growing both again because they were both great tasting tomatoes and the results may be completely different.

I have dropped Mortgage Lifter from my grow list despite its production and size. I found them somewhat bland and there are just so many really good tasting tomatoes that deserve the garden space.

[tam91]

I liked Black Krim and Cherokee Purple, but I actually found Black Krim to have the better taste and production. Neither were mealy for me.

I'm looking forward to trying Indian Stripe - unfortunately my Spudakee did not germinate, next year I guess.

Mortgage Lifter I grew once - it was productive, but I found it very bland and did not grow it again.

[hornstrider]

Ted........ be patient. You have had a wet spring. I am in Central Texas, and we have had the driest spring in recorded history. The only water my plants have received is what I have given them. Last year I grew CP, and although I enjoyed them immensely my wife, and oldest son did not care for them. I also grew CP's in the fall with much success, and once again I enjoyed them, but my wife, and son did not. This year is totally different. CP's this spring are my wife, and son's favorite tomato. I am also growing Black Krim, but I can't tell the difference between the two in looks, and taste. I must say this has been the best tomato season I have ever experienced in 7 years of Mater farming. So like I said be patient, and when it warms up, and dries out I think you will change your outlook. Some of my CP's crack at the stem, but I hardly loose much of the meat of the tomato. In fact I can cut the meat between the cracks, and the flavor, and texture is still good. .......I need to figure out how to resize the pictures...I posted a picture, but it was too big, and ruined the width of the thread.......I will try later

hornstrider,

I am patient. I ate another CP for lunch and it was much better. Slicing the tomato in half from the stem end to the blossom end, it appears the CP has very small gel pockets. I always think most of the flavor resides in the gel pockets. Thanks for the information. We are supposed to hit 90 degrees F. tomorrow and that will probably be the norm through August. That should really improve the tomato flavors.

About the photo, use a photo editor like Photoshop and choose edit, resize, canvass as the options. Resize it to about 800 pixels in width with the auto "maintain proportions turned on. Use medium quality as the quality choice and you should have a photo which fits well on the forum and is less than 300 kb in file size. If your using photobucket or flicker as your photo storage site, they have editors built in for resizing. I think Google Picasa web storage also has photo editing as does the Picasa program.

Ted

[b54red]

I like a simple little program called Xn-View that is a free download. You can change the size of pictures and do basic color corrections without a lot of hassle.

[RDUN]

Tedln,

I'm growing in the same area as you, but in containers rather than in the ground. Thus far I've harvested 1 or 2 each of Black Krim, Cherokee Purple, and Carbon and I can tell you that they have not been as good as in year's past, so I'm expecting improvement. Black Krim has been good.... not great, and CP and Carbon have been pretty mealy, which they haven't been in the past.

Overall, my tomatoes (plants and fruit) are not great... had early blight and septoria (I think) but have it mostly under control, but the plants are not as big as usual and the fruit has been on the smallish side as well.... don't know if it's the weather or changes I've made to my growing mix, etc.

I marked two tomatoes CP and BK and sent them into town for my daughter to sample and report back. She called and said "you know the Burger King tomato?" I said you must mean the Black Krim but Burger King is close enough. She said "okay, the Black Krim has a Chipotle flavor." I asked if "Chipotle" means it has a smokey flavor. According to her, smokey describes it perfectly. The Charley Papa (military phonetics) according to her, or the Cherokee Purple according to me; doesn't have the smokey flavor, but is an excellent tomato with a great flavor. She really likes both and her flavor detectors are much more sophiticated than mine. I also sent a BB or Big Beef as a flavor control point. She also liked the BB, but not as much as the BK and CP. She said neither seemed mealy to her.

Ted

[sfmathews]

Ted, my first CP and BK weren't really mealy, but kind of a buttery soft texture. I am sure they will improve to thieir juicy best as the season progresses. And the IS is also producing nicely (as Dewayne stated above).
Susan

Susan,

You describe it perfectly. Buttery soft is much more descriptive of the texture than mealy. I think the description for perfectly cooked pasta is "toothy". I prefer tomatoes with a "toothy" resistance instead of buttery soft.

Ted

[dice]

Try picking them a little underripe, when they have no give at all.
Let them ripen on the counter, and as soon as you can detect
a little give when you squeeze them eat them then. They seem
to have their best flavors when they are just ripe.

I find Cherokee Purple and Chocolate need some heat to get their
best flavor, too. In cool weather, they may still grow ok, but the
flavor pales.

Same with Brad's Black Heart (the glutamic acid is missing when
they ripen in cool weather).

Originally Posted by b54red

I like a simple little program called Xn-View that is a free download. You can change the size of pictures and do basic color corrections without a lot of hassle.

I downloaded it and it really is a nice little program. I thought I had seen and used all of them, but I was wrong. All the features are intuitive with the exception of batch conversions and you need to preset the filters. Once you have the filter levels set you can convert and resize in batches. Anyone who wants to edit and resize photos for this forum or any forum can use this little program.

Thanks

Ted

[kevinrs]

My Black Krims seem to be doing poorly, no discoloration or signs of damage, but the leaves are curled, basically the sides rolled inward, and the plants are smaller than just about everything else. No idea what's happening, will have to see if I can get some decent photos.

Originally Posted by kevinrs

My Black Krims seem to be doing poorly, no discoloration or signs of damage, but the leaves are curled, basically the sides rolled inward, and the plants are smaller than just about everything else. No idea what's happening, will have to see if I can get some decent photos.

Are you talking about seedlings recently planted or maturing plants? Are they in containers or in the soil?

My Black Krims were the fastest growing and producing tomato plants in the garden. When they reached about four feet tall, they slowed down and some others caught and passed them in stature. They are now about five feet tall. Some suckers are trying to grow taller, but the main stem seems to have stopped growing taller.

Ted

[dice]

Physiological leaf roll is common on Black Krim, but the plant
should not be growing more slowly than anything else.

[frankkj]

See if it looks like this.

http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=18369

Mine never got any worse, didn't get any better either.

Frank