Heirloom fruits and vegetables are becoming more and more popular as gardeners around the country become more aware of the superior taste of many of these old-time cultivars. And the tomato – easy to grow and a perennial favorite on the American table – leads the way among heirlooms as far as abundant varieties and availability.
Heirloom tomatoes come in an amazing rainbow of colors, sizes and tastes!
Photo Credit: Burpee Seed Co.
Both the delicious flesh and skin of Georgia Streak show this heirloom’s characteristic color markings.
Photo Credit: Mark A. Miller
But how did these delicious plants come to be? While a New World plant, the tomato probably wasn’t grown by Native Americans until the Spanish arrived. Europeans were likely the first to cultivate it here, and the fruit’s consumption spread slowly (perhaps because the plant’s a member of the poisonous nightshade family, so people were less likely to trust it). Eventually, tomato seeds crossed the Atlantic and were eventually grown throughout Europe – and even Asia.
Early tomato gardeners noted how the fruit was inclined to mutate into different colors, forms and tastes. Families tended to improve these early tomatoes according to their own preferences, and the result was a rainbow of colors and a smorgasbord of flavors and shapes we now enjoy. Today, heirloom growers can choose from reds, oranges and pinks; whites, creams and yellows; and purples, browns and blacks.
So what exactly is an heirloom plant? There’s a bit of controversy in regard to the tomato, but experts generally recognize three general categories: commercial, family and created.
Commercial heirlooms are those introduced by seed companies before 1940. Sometimes the seed companies bought the rights to a certain cultivar from a private source. The companies then either improved it or sold the seeds just as they were from the parent plant. Some of these commercial varieties are hybrids. Simply explained, a hybrid is a cross between two unrelated cultivars to obtain a desirable characteristic from each (for example, one parent for good taste and another for resistance to wilt). Some purists tend to discount commercial varieties as heirlooms because using hybrid seeds likely yields plants that are dissimilar from the cultivar.
Family heirlooms were developed for certain characteristics and then produced as an open-pollinated form. “Open pollinated” simply means that the plants will produce seeds carrying the exact characteristics of the parents (which means you can grow the same fruit year after year just by saving seeds). Curiously, many of the most treasured family heirlooms were developed in Europe and brought back to the Americas by European settlers. Most of the seeds from family heirlooms are “stabilized” for several generations – that is, grown and observed to ensure that there are no significant mutations or changes and that the seeds are “true to type.”
Created heirlooms are usually defined as those resulting from the deliberate crossing of two heirlooms or an heirloom and a hybrid.
While all this is helpful to know, the big question you probably still have is, “Why should I grow an heirloom tomato?” Well, the simple fact is they just look and taste fabulous! Heirloom varieties offer a real adventure in rediscovering how good a tomato can be. Admittedly, some varieties may be a challenge to grow – but then the challenge is part of the fun in producing these unique, colorful and quite delicious fruits. Another bonus is that most heirlooms are open-pollinated – so you can save the seeds for an abundant harvest of the same delicious tomato year after year. So this season, bring the past into the present in your vegetable garden with some delicious heirloom tomatoes!
