Paste/Sauce tomatos

I am getting my spring seed list together. This is my 7th year as a tomato/veggie grower. I have two large gardens. I refer to them as my front garden (next to the patio), and my back garden (next to my greenhouse). I have always grown slicer/salad tomatos. I have never grown paste/sauce tomato's in spite of the fact the my wife, and I can most of the tomato's we grow. I have 5 grown children, and we share a lot of our harvest with my children since they all love tomato's, and of course I eat more than my share of my crop. I have posted my grow list on drartur" thread. ( Cherokee Purple, Rutgers, Big Beef, Early Girl bush, Sun Gold, Juliet, and Stupice). I have ordered Roma, and San Marzano for canning. How big do these plants get? Can someone tell me some other Paste/Sauce varieties to grow in the Texas heat?

This message was edited Dec 17, 2011 10:16 AM

If you follow this link you'll see the oxhearts that Carolyn recommended for sauce/paste

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1233186/

Pinks

Kosovo
Anna Russian
Nicky Crain
Anna Maria's Heart

Reds

German Red Strawberry
Wes
Danko
Russian 117
Linnie's Oxheart
Indiana Red

Romas are low growing determinates, but I do stake them about waist high to get them off the ground and avoid the varmits around here. I like them because they are easy to grow and almost always productive, one of the best. Really good for sauces because of the low moisture content, but they can also be sliced in salads.

Al

HoneybeeNC, lycodad......Thank you for the imput.........so oxhearts are paste/sauce tomato's?

I agree that many heart-shaped toms are very meaty and are good for paste/sauce purposes. Also a couple of years ago, in a swap I received some seeds for Bijskij, a red plum tomato that produced like crazy. Only one plant supplied almost all our needs for sauce that season. (They were tagged Bijskij Zeltyi, but I was told that Zeltyi means yellow, so they were evidently mislabeled.)

hornstrider, when most folks think of paste tomatoes they're thinking of romas and San marzanos and Costolutos, etc., and what paste tomatoes have is dense flesh and few seeds.

But so do most of the heart varieties as well. And the heart varieties taste so much better than most paste tomatoes and the latter are much more prone to BER and Early Blight as well, which is why almost all of my tomato friends switched to using heart varieties for sauces many years ago.

I can list some conventional paste tomatoes that are pretty good if you'd like me too as I have in many threads here at DG.

Carolyn

Thank you Dr. Carolyn......."I have ordered Roma, Amish Paste (ordered Sat) and San Marzano for canning."......I suppose I should have read all of the threads before I ordered my seeds. So what you are saying is "Heart Tomato's are paste tomato's but tasted better..........correct? I just read this morning on another forum about Christopher Columbus, and I think I want to try that one also.

Dr Carolyn...........please tell me about Juliet. Is it a paste tomato? It is very meaty, and has few seeds. I have grown Juliet the past two falls (never in the spring). It does not have a great taste, but it good in a salad, and great for drying.....and it is very, very prolific for a fall tomato. Fall tomato's in general do not taste that great even a Cherokee Purple. I am thinking about growing them this spring. Thank you once again.

Thank you Dr. Carolyn..."I have ordered Roma, Amish Paste (ordered Sat) and San Marzano for canning."...I suppose I should have read all of the threads before I ordered my seeds. So what you are saying is "Heart Tomato's are paste tomato's but tasted better...correct? I just read this morning on another forum about Christopher Columbus, and I think I want to try that one also.

*****


I have to cut and paste or I often forget to answer the questions asked. LOL

Amish Paste is not a paste variety. Too juicy and too many seeds. I think I may have posted here or elsewhere here in this Forum that some varieties were named paste ones just b'c of the fruit shape. Another example is Lillian's Red Kansas Paste which is not a paste either.

The common understanding has been that so called paste tomatoes have a certain shape or come from a certain source, most often Italy or Spain, but there are certainly ones that do have dense flesh and few seeds and those are the heart varieties and some beefsteak varieties.

Summary? Heart varieties are not known as paste tomatoes but have the same dense fleash and few seeds as do paste tomatoes, but taste much better, are less susceptible to BER as well as Early Blight.

Yes, I know of the varity Christopher Columbus and know where you read about it, but I think it was jsut one person who said he liked it for sauces, etc., so a beefsteak type used as a apste, as I mentioned above as well.

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Dr Carolyn...please tell me about Juliet. Is it a paste tomato? It is very meaty, and has few seeds. I have grown Juliet the past two falls (never in the spring). It does not have a great taste, but it good in a salad, and great for drying...and it is very, very prolific for a fall tomato. Fall tomato's in general do not taste that great even a Cherokee Purple. I am thinking about growing them this spring. Thank you once again.

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Oh Boy, I'm not the one you want to talk about Juliet with b'c I don't like it all and I'm not alone on that. Tastes like cardboard to most. And no, it isn't a apste variety. It was bred by the Known-You seed company as a kind of saladette. But if you like it, then keep on growing it. ( smile)

Carolyn

I have had some experience with Juliet and I agree, indeed prolific. The first ripe fruit tend to be sort of hard and tasteless, as mentioned by several others. I found that the later fruit, the ones that were allowed to ripen longer on the vine, tasted much better (and sweeter) than the ones first picked. They also held their taste quality much longer than many other types. To me, the riper ones made a decent salad tomato.

Al

This message was edited Dec 20, 2011 5:09 PM

hornstrider, did you see the newest post about Christopher Coloumbus where it was said that it isn't always genetically stable?

http://t.tatianastomatobase.com:88/wiki/Christopher_Columbus

Tania doesn't have that much info about, I don't think there is much, but if you want to try it you can try GlecklerSeemen as Tania listed Adam as having the seed for 2011 and I don't know if he's yet updated his website but if there was no crop loss, he had a terrible summer weather-wise, it should be there for 2012.

Hope that helps.

Carolyn

Carolyn...........thank you very much. You are everywhere (all forums) helping people like me out. That is very nice of you to go to all of the trouble to make sure questions are answered. You must sleep well at night knowing you helped all of us amateur mater growers...........I have growing maters for 7 years, and I am still an amateur. It is all starting to sink in though, because of people like you. Thanks, and Merry Christmas!!

lycodad......I agree that if you leave Juliet tomato's on the vine until they are ripe red they are a good salad tomato in the fall. They are also good for drying. These are the only tomato's I have dried so I don't have anything to compare them to.