I garden in the Berkshire Hills of southwestern Massachusetts where the growing season is short and summer weather is often cool and cloudy. I grow all my tomatoes from seed so that I can cultivate short season varieties that fruit well in my climate. A Czech heirloom, ‘Stupice,’ is a long term favorite - small but abundant and very flavorful fruit. I’ve had a persistent problem with late blight attacking my tomatoes so this year I’m also growing several resistant cultivars: ‘Defiant’ (bed by Johnny’s Selected Seeds in Winslow, Maine), 'Galahad, ‘Juliet’, and ‘Legend.’ ‘Stupice’ is not blight resistant but it is early bearing so it yields a good crop before late blight hist it. Despite the challenging climate I made and canned 50 pints of sauce last year.
I planted a bunch of new to.me varieties. Simplicity, Rubie, Little Margo, Loretta, Steller. I also put in Celebrity and Better Boy. Total of 30 tomato plants. Almost as many peppers.
I’m in the PNW as well (South Puget Sound, WA) and it has been getting hotter and hotter. Really hot! Branch out and try some new ones you think sound good bacause you never know what might work!
Yeah I’m not sure. My seed is about 12 years old. Well it’s been 12 years of use. I grow it about every four years or so. I used to make my own sauce but found I can make great sauce from canned tomatoes.
I just do that now. It was fun though to make your own. Just to much work for this old man.
Yeah a #10 can is pretty easy for a sauce. But for my pizzas and salsas nothing beats amazing paste tomatoes. Also growing next to each other Striped Roman was very similar in flavor and shape as Romeo but not as great.
Well that depends on what you use I prefer these for most sauces but not all.
A lot use San Marzano but I like the flavor of these more.
Grown in California. They’re using systemic pesticides on California grown tomatoes. Unfortunately. Of course not those if they’re organic I’ll have to try them.
I use the Mutti from Italy but I’ve also heard they’ve gotten caught using Chinese tomatoes. But it’s still pretty good.
Contadena low salt is my favorite that I can get here but it’s hard to find and I don’t buy most foods online.
That’s why it’s best to grow our own.
I don’t either, link was for reference.
Lots of ethnic stores around here I count on for such products. I also enjoy middle eastern dishes and good pita bread is not easy to find. Luckily a local shop produces fantastic pita bread. Nothing like warm just baked pita. Same for real bagels. I’m going out to get some for the weekend. The city of Birmingham has many Jewish bakeries and only about ten miles away. Nothing like warm bagels. Real bagels almost the size of hub caps! We love to make our own bread too.
What’s the scoop on oxheart tomatoes?
I don’t think I’ve ever tasted or even seen one and I’ve certainly never grown one.
Are any of them worth growing, what uses are they good for?
