Tomatoes. What to plant, where to source, and how to start your seeds the right way.

I am a self-proclaimed heirloom tomato junkie. I fell in love with tomatoes as a child in my grandfather's garden. He was a seed distributor for Burpee in his later years and he grew Better Boy tomatoes... and that's it. I love a good red slicer, and that is exactly what Better Boy is. It also lends itself well to an old man with a pocket knife and salt shaker, sharing tomatoes with his granddaughter on a warm day in the garden. Burpee has done their job well - they got me to fall in love with a tomato.

Fast forward to my first garden. My husband and I, just married, cleared trees from our tiny 1/8-acre piece of land. We tilled the soil with the first thing bought as a married couple - our Craftsman tiller (which finally bit the dust this last year - after 23 years of prepping gardens all over northern Utah, many for the first time). I wandered the local nurseries, grabbed the Better Boy that I had fallen head over heels for as a child, and then out of curiosity, picked up a few different tomatoes to try. Among the first odd tomatoes to make it to our garden was the Green Zebra. My husband, who "hated tomatoes" was instantly hooked. The Baker Creek Seed Catalog soon became a reading staple, we were introduced to people such as William Woys Weaver (Roughwood Seeds) and Brad Gates (Wild Boar Farms), both of whom changed my view of the importance of heirlooms, breeding, and trying new combinations. The tomato possibilities seemed endless, and still do.

What is an heirloom tomato?

There are several definitions of heirloom, but I stick to plants that are greater than 50 years old and genetically stable when open pollinated. This means when you plant the seeds from an heirloom tomato that you grew - you are very likely to get the exact same tomato that you saved seeds from. These plants tend to be large, vigorous, and produce fruits with a variety of colors, shapes, and are thinner skinned. They have some of the most delicious flavor profiles you will ever taste and leave your taste buds longing for more. Additionally, many of these seeds have been passed down over multiple generations with families and many have stories relating to their name or history. Being a hopeless romantic, I fall hard for a good story about a tomato that has traveled the world and maybe even changed the course of history (San Marzano anyone???).

What is a hybrid tomato?

Alternatively a hybrid tomato is one that is crossed giving you a genetically unique combination that is not genetically stable. If you plant seeds from a hybrid you will likely grow a plant that more closely resembles one of the parent plants - not the plant you collected the seeds from. These plants tend to be excellent producers and are very reliable and some can offer resistance to certain diseases. This is my grandfather's trusty Better Boy but also includes familiar names such as Early Girl, Big Boy, Celebrity and Fourth of July. In the past hybrids haven't had the flashy colors and explosive flavors that you get from an heirloom. Breeders like Burpee have been hard at work creating hybrids that can compete with the heirlooms when it comes to taste and flavor.

So what is better, heirloom or hybrid?

Honestly, both categories have something excellent to offer. The heirlooms bring flavor, color, and excitement while the hybrids make sure you get excellent and reliable yields of good tasting tomatoes. I am swooning over a new term called HYLOOM. This is crossing hybrids and heirlooms - hybridizing between the two - to create something extra special. I am completely obsessed with this idea. Brad Gates from Wild Boar Farm has been crossing heirlooms for many years and is one of the first to bring this idea to light. Beyond Wild Boar Farms, you can find some of the specific hylooms at High Mowing Organic Seeds and with names such as CubaLibre, GinFiz, and MaiTai and they are on my "to try" list for 2025.

Tomato terms - determinate and indeterminate. You may have heard these terms before and they become important when considering space, trellising, or timing of harvest.

Determinant tomatoes are bush tomatoes. They only get a certain height and they flower and set fruit once. This means you do not get a harvest throughout the entire season, but can harvest and process once and be done. Common varieties include Roma, Rutgers, Bush Early Girl, Health Kick, Marglobe, Homestead, Patio Plum, Black Sea Man and others. These tomatoes generally take up less space, so if you are limited in space, consider determinants.

Indeterminate tomatoes are vining types of tomatoes. These tomatoes continue to grow and produce as long as conditions are favorable and they can become massive. My great uncle owned and operated a citrus grove in Palm Springs, California for many years and he grew an indeterminate tomato up to the top of a telephone pole. The fruit production starts at the base and moves upward, so harvesting tomatoes at the top of a telephone pole was not convenient, but it certainly was a unique experience. Production continues along throughout the season, so these tomatoes can be harvested until conditions are unfavorable or until the tomato is removed. Heirlooms are generally indeterminate. These tomatoes also lend themselves well to string trellising which can help save space. This method requires some unique pruning that we will discuss later in the season, so stay tuned.

What I am planting in 2024:

Here's my list of tomatoes for my garden in 2024. I grow one of each giving me a wide variety and assortment in my garden and also to cook with. Most are new to me but there are a few repeats that I can't live without. Since tomato photos are often copyright protected, I have linked each tomato discussed to the site where I sourced them from. I do recommend that you take time to look through some of my favorite sites for tomato seeds, but readers beware - once you start tomato shopping, you may not be able to stop!

Some of my favorite tomato sites:

Wild Boar Farms - wildboarfarms.com

Truelove Seeds - trueloveseeds.com

Restoration Seeds - restorationseeds.com

Forgotten Heirlooms - forgottenheirlooms.com

Renaissance Farms - renaissancefarms.org

Secret Seed Cartel - secretseedcartel.com

Farmacie Isolde - farmacieisolde.com

High Mowing Organic Seeds - highmowingseeds.com

Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds - rareseeds.com

Roughwood Seeds - seedways.org

TomatoFest - tomatofest.com

Burpee - burpee.com

Johnny's Seeds - johnnyseeds.com

And if you really want to take a deep dive into tomatoes, check out the resources available through the World Tomato Society. There are retailers allover the world linked here and some informative resources on disease and taxonomy. It is fascinating!

CHERRY AND COCKTAIL TOMATOES

Two Tasty. This is a new hybrid from Burpee that I grew last year. My family couldn't get enough of the grape-sized tomatoes that start purple and ripen to red with deep colored shoulders. A delicious snacking tomato that even kept my teenagers reaching for tomatoes. I don't typically repeat tomatoes, and to be given space in the garden for a second year means this is a definite winner in my book.

PASTE AND SAUCE TOMATOES

Cow's Tit. With a name like Cow's Tit, how can I not grow this tomato? This is a family heirloom that I sourced from Seed Savers Exchange, but it can also be found at Renaissance Farms. A 4 to 6-inch long paste tomato that roasts exceptionally well and has few seeds, this is one I am really looking forward to for making sauces.

Blush. Fruits are bright yellow with red marbling and an elongated shape. I love the idea of a yellow tomato with a classic paste tomato shape. Sourced from Johnny's Seeds.

Butalina di Castellamonte. An heirloom sauce tomato from Northern Italy from before 1900. This tomato can be used for cooking, canning or drying and has a classic sauce tomato flavor. This variety was the precursor to San Marzano, which became more popular due to lower processing costs. Available from Truelove Seeds.

Fleur di Reagir. A French variety that can withstand heat, which is unusual. This is a flattened and fluted deep red tomato that doubles as a slicer and a sauce tomato. Produces exceptionally large fruit about 1.5 lbs. Very excited to try this gorgeous variety, originally found through Dutch supplier Badskin Farms, but I sourced from Renaissance Farms in the interest of a smaller carbon footprint.

Riccio di Parma. This is a gorgeous pleated sauce tomato that comes on a bit late (I am hoping for a long fall season with this one). Due to later fruit set, I will start this tomato earlier than normal to see if I can speed the process along by a few weeks. Sourced from Renaissance Farms who reports it has a stronger flavor but makes a beautiful sauce.

Goldman's Italian American. Unique squatty, pear-shaped tomatoes that are ribbed and pleated. This tomato was found at a roadside stand in Italy by Amy Goldman (author of 'The Heirloom Tomato') and named for her father's grocery store in New York. I have grown this tomato a number of times and grow it every few years to keep my seed supply in good shape. The texture of this tomato is remarkably smooth and it makes an excellent fresh or cooked tomato. Absolutely one of my favorites. Can be sourced from Restoration Seeds.

SLICING AND FRESH EATING TOMATOES

Aunt Lou's Underground Railroad. This is a tomato with a whopper of a story and one that I am so excited to grow. The story starts in mid-19th century America with a possibly escaped slave traveling from Kentucky to Ripley, Ohio. Ripley was home to Rankin House, which was an important safe house on the underground railroad. It was in this town that the man shared some tomato seeds with a white woman named Lou. Aunt Lou shared the seeds with her nephew, Francis Parker, who distributed the seeds far and wide along with a written description of the tomato and the story. He shared the seeds with a Mr. Ellis in Sardinia, Ohio who shared them with tomato enthusiasts Gary Millwood of Kentucky's Blue Ribbon Tomatoes and Mary Stenger, a seed keeper in Berea, KY. The tomato was listed in the Seed Saver's Exchange Catalog in 2010 and was nominated for the Slow Food Ark of Taste in 2018. Available from Truelove Seeds.

Chondrokatsari. Another selection available from Truelove Seeds, the name of this tomato translates to "fat and curly". This beauty of a tomato hails from Greece and is referred to as a Kalamata type - meaning Greek, like Kalamata olives. Fruits are fluted, which is by far my favorite tomato shape and supposedly have a slightly acidic and rich flavor. It is said to taste like the Mediterranean, which was all I needed to nudge me to plant this beauty. This tomato is currently sold out as of March 2024, but put it on your list for next year.

Pepe Gigante. This Goliath of a tomato was acquired by Joe of Forgotten Heirlooms. While dining in Hartford, Connecticut at a restaurant owned by a Spanish immigrant he started to talk about tomatoes with the owner, Pepe. Showing Pepe some of the tomatoes he grew, Pepe was impressed, but left for a moment and returned to the table with a tomato of his own saying, “ Now here is a tomato!”  It was a massive three pound beauty, deep orange red in color. Pepe had acquired from a neighbor more than twenty years ago.  He did not have a name for it, but said it was the best tasting tomato that he knew.  Joe named this in honor of Pepe who has maintained this monster for the last couple of decades.

Olena Ukrainian. I worked with a woman named Olena from Ukraine and when I saw this tomato, I knew I needed to grow it. This potato leaf variety is a family heirloom from Odessa, Ukraine originally from Olena Warshova. A pink beefsteak with old time flavor that is perfect on a sandwich. This is another gem sourced from Forgotten Heirlooms.

Red Beauty. A gorgeous red slicer from one of my favorite tomato breeders, Brad Gates of Wild Boar Farms. Produces good sized red slicing tomatoes with deep purple shoulders. Reportedly an excellent storing tomato that is also able to stay on the vine for a good period of time. If you take the time to check out this tomato, look at the other selections available from Brad - he is an incredible tomato breeder and I have grown some of the tastiest tomatoes from him. I would recommend Brad's Atomic Grape, Berkeley Tie Die, Dark Galaxy, among others. Also of note, Brad sells seeds for both the Costoluoto Genovese and Green Zebra - two of my all time favorite tomatoes.

Red Target. From Taiwan, which is where I spent a few years living as a child. This tomato produces 12 oz. fruits on determinate plants (no string trellising for this tomato). Fruits are olive green with red bottoms when ripe. From one of my favorite places to source funky tomatoes, Secret Seed Cartel.

Whetstone Wonder. Another selection from Secret Seed Cartel, this tomato is a huge pink beefsteak passed down through the Norton/Snell family in Somerset, Kentucky. Fruits are reported to be larger than 2 pounds. Secret Seed Cartel no longer carries this tomato, however, I have linked to the TomatoFest website which is a never ending extravaganza of tomato seeds where a tomato lover like myself could get lost for hours! They also specialize in dwarf and microdwarf tomato varieties which is my newest obsession. There is a $15 USD minimum order amount, but for the rare dwarf varieties they sell, I can easily find enough tomatoes to meet that requirement!

Copper River. This tomato was created by Lynn Brown of Napa Valley, California. It has a beautiful copper color and when cut it has a bright pink interior. Secret Seed Cartel.

DWARF AND MICRODWARF TOMATOES

Tennessee Suited Dwarf. A red and green striped dwarf tomato that is the result of a cross between Berkeley Tie Dye and Rotella Purple. This was developed by members of the "Dwarf Tomato Project" and is an excellent tomato for container gardening. It was originally named 'Tidy' by Patrina Small of Australia in 2009. Can be sourced from Victory Seed Company.

Groovy Tunes Microdwarf. Developed by Bunny Hop Tomatoes, this is a purple tomato with green stripes and neon green leaves. This is an excellent producer and works remarkably well in small spaces. An interesting trait of this tomato is that the fruit size seems to be related to container size. When planted in a 12-inch container this variety produced cherry sized tomatoes but when given more space (I plant mine in a raised bed and found this to be true) the tomatoes are more like plum or cocktail tomatoes in size. Another favorite getting a second chance in my garden this year, due to its small space need and vigorous production.

Jackass Green Dwarf. Once again, how can I resist this name? This is a dwarf tomato that gets about 3-feet tall. Excellent for smaller spaces, the fruits are bright green and a good size for salads and fresh eating. A good tomato salad needs the bright color and flavor of a green tomato. Sourced from Renaissance Farms.

As these grow and develop, I will be honestly reviewing them here and on Instagram (@Utahfarmgal). Giving a look at what these varieties realistically produce, how they taste and if they hold up under the brutal Utah growing conditions.

So, what will you be growing?