A couple of 'normal store bought tomato' questions

16 years ago

I have long held the belief, with little evidence to back it

up, that store bought tomatos are 'cardboard' primarily because of growing methods rather than breed.

I believed there are massive amounts of non organic... for lack of a better wordm shallow... fertlizers, then they are picked green and force ripened.

Each contributing equally to the utter lack of taste.

I don't use industrial fertilizers for fear of blandness.

But now I question my assumptions and fear,

and wonder how much *breed* has to do with it.

What type of tomatos are store bought slicing tomatoes?

When using organic peace loving hippy gardening techniques, and vine ripenening, are those types actually kinda tasty?

I'd just plant some seeds to find out, but am learning about how hybrids diverge from the parent.

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Comments (7)

jtcm05
16 years ago
IMO growing methods probably only contributes minimally to the lack of taste. Maybe 5-10% The varieties on store shelves are bred purely for long storage, blemish-free fruit and to hold up to the rigors of shipping and handling. Decent taste is absolutely last on the list of desirable traits to select for.
zeuspaul
16 years ago
Most of my home grown tomatoes now taste like store bought tomatoes. These tomatoes are coming from the same plants that produced good tasting tomatoes during the summer growing season.

In addition to the cardboard flavor they all have thick skins.

My conclusion is it's the growing conditions and how ripe they are when you pick that makes the most difference in flavor.

Zeuspaul
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pyrorob
16 years ago
Many people have tried to attribute the lack of taste of commercial tomatoes to growing methods but from what I have seen in much of the hydroponics research is that the strain of tomato is what is to blame.

Commercial tomatoes are bred for ability to be machine picked, resistance to damage during handling / shipping, ripening all at the same time, thick skins, dark red color, etc. Unlike the home tomato grower, the industry is not necessarily concerned about flavor. What good is a flavorful tomato on the shelf at the grocery store if it has a dent or bruise on it because of it's thin skin? If people don't buy it, they will never know how good it tastes?

--->Rob
sneezer2
16 years ago
Answer these questions by reading a book titled:

Tomatoes edited by E. Heuvelink in the Crop Production Science in Horticulture series.

It's very expensive, so you wouldn't want to buy it. I got a copy through interlibrary loan at my public library.
It's actually aimed at the European tomato production industry, which is quite advanced over ours
but there are a couple of American contributors. In this book you will get a very
good picture of how and why the commercial tomato is what it is. And in fact, you may see that there are some
genuine efforts to put a good tasting tomato on the store shelf. You may also pick up some good tips to apply to
your own practices. This is a serious scientific and intellectual slog, so don't try it unless you have the stamina.
If you do, though, it is very rewarding.

See it on Amazon by using advanced search on author Heuvelink.
carolyn137
16 years ago
Another issue, especially with winter shipped in tomatoes, is that it's common to pick the tomatoes at the mature green stage and then gas them with ethylene gas which initiates a ripening process, but in doing that it's mainly a color change and any inherent taste has little or no time to develop since the fruits are off the vine and can't synthesize any/few of the about 400 organic compounds that have been IDed as being associated with taste, but not yet isolated as specific organic compounds. Just blips on a gas chromotography display.

If you Google this issue you'll see that some varieties are more gassable, if that's a word, so those are the ones most used by large commercial operations that do gas fruits.

Fruits produce their own ethylene gas which initiates a ripening sequence in the normal course of events, so artificially gassing them, while it's not natural, is one way of coloring them up.

Carolyn
reginald_317
16 years ago
...with winter shipped in tomatoes, is that it's common to pick the tomatoes at the mature green stage and then gas...

Carolyn, say it ain't so. A buddy of mine near Harrisburg PA recently purchased some Ugly Ripe toms at a local super. He did this at my suggestion (I also told him that Joe Procacci personally roams around in his FL fields supervising the planting, growing and ripe harvesting of his UR toms, all winter long). He told me that they looked ripe and were ugly enuf to suggest that they would have good taste -- but, unfortunately, he informed me that they tasted no better than other, cheaper tomatoes. He is now indicating that I owe him some compensation for my ill-advised suggestion.

Would a 'refund' be in order here ?

Reg
magnolias4ever
16 years ago
I've heard the same thing about the ethylene gas being used to "ripen up" tomatos. It makes sense that doing this would artifically speed up the process and render those poor tomatos tasteless like cardboard.... I don't know much about hydroponics and growing tomatos using this process either, but I just know that I love the tomatos that I grow in my garden that are planted in rich, natural, organic compost (alone with some vermiculite and peat moss).

Judy (ahhh,,,, just thinking about watching that first tomato of the season slowly ripen on the vine -- checking on its progress day after day until it's finally ready to pick and run inside to slice and make a great tasting tomato sandwich sprinkled with some salt and pepper..... anyone's mouth watering yet??? LOL)

Here is a link that might be useful: Ft2Garden.com

A couple of 'normal store bought tomato' questions

Comments (7)

jtcm05

zeuspaul

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