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I'd like to try one, but I'd limit my expectations. My wife and I stumbled upon a local group selling heirloom tomato plants a couple of years ago. We grew a f

I'd like to try one, but I'd limit my expectations. My wife and I stumbled upon a local group selling heirloom tomato plants a couple of years ago. We grew a few and soon realized why they became heirlooms. The nicest thing that can be said is that they must be an acquired taste.

chubot 3y ago
Heirlooms are less consistent for sure. They can be more sensitive to their growing conditions too. But IMO commodity tomatoes are some of the "easiest" things to improve upon. Regular supermarket tomatoes are often flavorless, the farmer's market tomatoes are often better (e.g. in California) So heirlooms have higher highs and lower lows IMO commodity tomatoes are consistent, but consistently "meh" ...
- ipcress_file 3y ago
  My experience is that contemporary varieties of tomatoes grown at home are much better than those grown by the big producers. I'm not sure why, but our tomatoes are always red all the way through. The ones from the store are often whiter and coarse-grained inside. Actually, the same thing happens with strawberries.
  - Texasian 3y ago
    The tomatoes and strawberries you grow at home don’t need to hold up to long distance shipping. Not to mention, the mass market fruits and veg don’t have somebody personally motivated by getting something at the peak of ripeness. Like most things, it’s a different set of priorities and incentives that drive different results.
  - JoeAltmaier 3y ago
    Conventional wisdom says they've been bred for resiliency, predictable ripening, long lasting. Not flavor. One clue is, the gene that ripens tomatoes is also the one that causes the skin to split. So the seeds get spread. But not useful for commercial use, as split tomatoes are worthless to sell. So they use varieties that don't express that gene. So they don't ripen much. So they are tasteless, no matter how long on the vine. Definitely grow your own, if you care about tomatoes at all and have the room@!
    - throwup238 3y ago
      It's not just conventional wisdom, there have been genetic studies: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1222218 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1222218 A mutation of the SlGLK2 gene results in significantly less sugar in the fruit while slowing down ripening for transport.
  - buildsjets 3y ago
    Commercially grown tomatoes are harvested while they are hard and green, transported and stored in that state, artfically reddened by exposing to them to ethylene in a gas chamber, then presented for sale in the marketplace as "ripe." Would you like to know how "Not From Concentrate" orange juice is manufactured? It may not be concentrated, but it involves many industrial processes and can be up to a year old when you buy it. Fake food.
    - MostlyStable 3y ago
      I'm someone who very much believes in home grown food whenever possible. I have a very large garden (larger than probably 80%+ of the country could even hope to have, thanks to living in the country) and I grow a very large proportion of all the vegetables I eat. So I'm someone who is sympathetic to your view. But I can't disagree strongly enough with calling store-bought and/or industrialized food "fake". It's different. It has different tradeoffs. It's worse in some ways (and better in others), but what it most definitely is not is "fake".
    - ipcress_file 3y ago
      Thank you for that explanation. Now I understand why the home-grown versions of the same tomatoes are so different!
    - chubot 3y ago
      I didn't know about the tomatoes, but it doesn't surprise me anymore. I think I learned about Salmon being artifically pink from Hacker News several years ago https://qz.com/358811/heres-why-your-farmed-salmon-has-color-added-to-it https://qz.com/358811/heres-why-your-farmed-salmon-has-color... On the bright side, essentially everyone I know seems to like local produce, BEFORE I tell them it's local. Their taste buds are still attuned, and can tell the difference
salad-tycoon 3y ago
There isn’t one variety of heirloom. There are many. Personally, I like the purple ones. A deeper, smokier flavor. Also pineapple tomatoes are delicious sweet little treats with a subtle pineapple taste. Bakers creek/rare seed has a great catalogue. That said, we’ve had duds. Only have two growing seasons under my belt.
- ipcress_file 3y ago
  Definitely a fair comment. I didn't mean to imply that I'd attempted to grow all of the heirlooms out there!
phyzome 3y ago
They're heirlooms because they worked really, really well for one family in one location for many years. But if you grow them in different conditions, you may get vary different results.
sweettea 3y ago
Tomatoe flavors are (in addition to variety) extremely sensitive to nutrients and growing condition. I've had Barrys Crazy Cherry be one of the best flavors ever one year, rich and lowacid and textured and sweet, and absolute watery cardboard the next year - from the same seed batch on a semipro scale.

chubot 3y ago

Heirlooms are less consistent for sure. They can be more sensitive to their growing conditions too. But IMO commodity tomatoes are some of the "easiest" things to improve upon. Regular supermarket tomatoes are often flavorless, the farmer's market tomatoes are often better (e.g. in California) So heirlooms have higher highs and lower lows IMO commodity tomatoes are consistent, but consistently "meh" ...

ipcress_file 3y ago
My experience is that contemporary varieties of tomatoes grown at home are much better than those grown by the big producers. I'm not sure why, but our tomatoes are always red all the way through. The ones from the store are often whiter and coarse-grained inside. Actually, the same thing happens with strawberries.
- Texasian 3y ago
  The tomatoes and strawberries you grow at home don’t need to hold up to long distance shipping. Not to mention, the mass market fruits and veg don’t have somebody personally motivated by getting something at the peak of ripeness. Like most things, it’s a different set of priorities and incentives that drive different results.
- JoeAltmaier 3y ago
  Conventional wisdom says they've been bred for resiliency, predictable ripening, long lasting. Not flavor. One clue is, the gene that ripens tomatoes is also the one that causes the skin to split. So the seeds get spread. But not useful for commercial use, as split tomatoes are worthless to sell. So they use varieties that don't express that gene. So they don't ripen much. So they are tasteless, no matter how long on the vine. Definitely grow your own, if you care about tomatoes at all and have the room@!
  - throwup238 3y ago
    It's not just conventional wisdom, there have been genetic studies: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1222218 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1222218 A mutation of the SlGLK2 gene results in significantly less sugar in the fruit while slowing down ripening for transport.
- buildsjets 3y ago
  Commercially grown tomatoes are harvested while they are hard and green, transported and stored in that state, artfically reddened by exposing to them to ethylene in a gas chamber, then presented for sale in the marketplace as "ripe." Would you like to know how "Not From Concentrate" orange juice is manufactured? It may not be concentrated, but it involves many industrial processes and can be up to a year old when you buy it. Fake food.
  - MostlyStable 3y ago
    I'm someone who very much believes in home grown food whenever possible. I have a very large garden (larger than probably 80%+ of the country could even hope to have, thanks to living in the country) and I grow a very large proportion of all the vegetables I eat. So I'm someone who is sympathetic to your view. But I can't disagree strongly enough with calling store-bought and/or industrialized food "fake". It's different. It has different tradeoffs. It's worse in some ways (and better in others), but what it most definitely is not is "fake".
  - ipcress_file 3y ago
    Thank you for that explanation. Now I understand why the home-grown versions of the same tomatoes are so different!
  - chubot 3y ago
    I didn't know about the tomatoes, but it doesn't surprise me anymore. I think I learned about Salmon being artifically pink from Hacker News several years ago https://qz.com/358811/heres-why-your-farmed-salmon-has-color-added-to-it https://qz.com/358811/heres-why-your-farmed-salmon-has-color... On the bright side, essentially everyone I know seems to like local produce, BEFORE I tell them it's local. Their taste buds are still attuned, and can tell the difference

salad-tycoon 3y ago

There isn’t one variety of heirloom. There are many. Personally, I like the purple ones. A deeper, smokier flavor. Also pineapple tomatoes are delicious sweet little treats with a subtle pineapple taste. Bakers creek/rare seed has a great catalogue. That said, we’ve had duds. Only have two growing seasons under my belt.

ipcress_file 3y ago
Definitely a fair comment. I didn't mean to imply that I'd attempted to grow all of the heirlooms out there!

phyzome 3y ago

They're heirlooms because they worked really, really well for one family in one location for many years. But if you grow them in different conditions, you may get vary different results.

sweettea 3y ago

Tomatoe flavors are (in addition to variety) extremely sensitive to nutrients and growing condition. I've had Barrys Crazy Cherry be one of the best flavors ever one year, rich and lowacid and textured and sweet, and absolute watery cardboard the next year - from the same seed batch on a semipro scale.