Medovyi Spas (Honey Salvation) Tomato Review & Photos

Here is how my Medovyi Spas (Honey Salvation) turned out. Seeds from SibSad.

Description from the vendor: Large-fruited, mid-season variety for greenhouses and outdoors. Stands out with its large, kidney-shaped fruits of a warm honey-yellow color. The flesh is very pleasant, sweet, with almost no acid.

Mine is growing in the greenhouse, tall vine. I absolutely loved the flavor, sweet and juicy.

Edited January 24, 2015 by Drosera

My Medovyi Spas is also beautiful and delicious. I’ve been growing it for 3 years now, saving my own seeds, and I’m very happy with it. 👍

I grew it for the first time this year, but I’m definitely growing it again next year without a doubt.

My Medovyi Spas got hit with leaf mold pretty early on (not resistant), but I liked it based on all other parameters—tasty and beautiful.

Set the first 2 trusses well, then just a little bit more up top…

How is it with overall yield and dropping blossoms on the trusses?

Yield is below average compared to the rest of my garden (and not just for me, but for the person who gave me the seeds and has been growing it for years). Since it’s a northern-type tomato with thin wispy leaves, it hates the heat. But it’s also a fussy delicacy in the cold. It set 2-3 fruits per cluster and grew them to a medium size.

But the taste is genuinely pure Honey!!! 😋 Grow it as a delicacy, not for massive harvests. It even turned out sweeter than Ashgabat Heart, though it started ripening later.

I’m dreaming of finding the perfect yellow-orange variety: early like Ashgabat Heart, incredibly sweet like Honey Salvation, heavy yielding like Amana Orange, and bulletproof against cracking and disease like Orange German Strawberry.

Grew Medovyi Spas for the first time this year. SibSad seeds. The yield honestly didn’t impress me much. The second and third trusses got hit with BER. The trusses above that were fine and the fruits were larger. At first, I decided I wouldn’t grow it again.

But… when I tried the tomatoes that I had picked and let sit on the counter for about 2 weeks, oh man, did I love them 😋 They actually turned out tastier than the ripe ones picked fresh off the vine. I’ll be growing it next year strictly for that flavor.

Zulfiya said:
Yield is below average compared to the rest of my garden…

I agree with the author that varieties behave differently in different regions. It didn’t start setting fruit well for me the first year either, but by the second year, it clearly got used to my dirt. Not all varieties performed for me the way folks brag about them here. But we aren’t used to giving up…

Personally, I feel like Medovyi Spas was a success for me. But everyone has their own opinion. 😊 Apologies to the poster if I came across too blunt.

VALENTINA/Abakan said:
Personally, I feel like Honey Salvation was a success for me. But everyone has their own opinion. 😊 Apologies to the poster if I came across too blunt.

Excuse me, but looking at your photo, you have about 7-8 fruits there? And you consider that a success? Seems to me that kind of yield is exactly what we call average or even below average… or am I wrong? The photo disappeared 😲… well, whatever.

I won’t be original here, my outdoor yields didn’t shine either. Got maybe 10-12 fruits, give or take, pruned to 2 leaders. The texture seemed a bit dry and bland to me, though the sweetness was definitely there. Basically, it’s not a bad variety, but nothing outstanding IMO.

Edited November 15, 2014 by vikysia

vikysia said:
Excuse me, but looking at your photo, you have about 7-8 fruits there? And you consider that a success?…

Well, the first year I literally only got a couple of fruits )))

Edited February 14, 2015 by Drosera

Seeds from SibSad.
Heavy yielder, but highly sensitive to BER (loves calcium), even though it sets fruit well in the heat. In 2011 I let it run to 4 leaders, and the fruits were on the smaller side. In 2012 I pruned to 2 leaders, got a mix of larger and smaller fruits.

Taste-wise, it’s very diet-friendly, slightly sweet. It is incredibly hard to save seeds from this one because sometimes there are only 2-3 mature seeds in the entire fruit – it’s just pure meat. Every single one grew into these gorgeous hearts:

vikysia said:
Basically, it’s not a bad variety, but nothing outstanding IMO.

Completely agree, the variety is nothing outstanding ((.

Edited February 14, 2015 by Drosera

I’m officially in the Medovyi Spas fan club)))
I agree with folks who say it’s meaty, tasty, has very few seeds, and zero acid! True, the yields aren’t insane, but you can forgive that for the taste alone. It also bumped up its yield in the 2nd year for me, just like the other ladies mentioned. Growing it now, and will keep growing it 😋

What a beauty! Adding this straight to my want list :), gonna go hunt down some seeds…

What is its DTM like?

Grew Medovyi Spas for the first time in 2014, and I’m very happy with it!!! Not overly sprawling, the fruits are delicious, meaty, and gorgeous. If you thin the fruit count, they get huge; if you don’t, you’ll get a bunch of smaller ones, but they taste just as good. … Grew it in the greenhouse, pruned to 2 leaders, let them ripen fully on the vine. Had zero BER, everything was clean and tidy. In the fall during the rainy season a few cracked, but almost all my varieties cracked then, so I don’t consider that a specific flaw of this strain. My conclusion: a must-grow! 🙂

Semechka said:
What is its DTM like?

SibSad claims it’s mid-season. For me, the first fruits started ripening right alongside the early varieties, because the harvest isn’t concentrated all at once, it’s spread out over time.

In terms of sweetness and balanced flavor, it falls a bit behind certain bicolors (like Ananas Noire), but for anyone dealing with acid reflux issues, this is absolutely perfect because it has so little acid. That’s exactly why this variety ended up in my collection. It’s undeniably beautiful! And when you’ve got up to 11 trusses of these beauties on a vine, it’s just a joy to look at )))

Semechka said:
What a beauty! Adding this straight to my want list :), gonna go hunt down some seeds…
What is its DTM like?

Thanks for the compliment on the beauty)) and it really is very tasty 😘

It’s an honest mid-season, no stretching the truth there.

My seeds were standard commercial SibSad ones, plus I had some from Ksyusha in Belarus, and both turned out to be the correct true-to-type strain 👍

Semechka said:
How is it with overall yield and dropping blossoms on the trusses?

The bottom set well, but by the 3rd and 4th truss it was just throwing single fruits. Seeds were from SibSad, zero BER for me 🙂

Honey Salvation is such a delicious tomato! And it makes incredible juice!… 👍👍👍 One of my favorites!

My seeds were from SibSad 😞 😞 😞

Mine turned out exactly the same this year from SibSad 😢

Could you please share the lot numbers on those packets? 😞

Here is my Medovyi Spas. Grew it in 2013, planted three vines: one outdoors, two in the greenhouse. The ones in the greenhouse turned out to be the true strain and were delicious 😋. Average yield, the vine was scrawny and hit about 5 ft (1.5 m). I saved seeds from those.

yuriy said:
Could you please share the lot numbers on those packets? 😞

1558

yuriy said:
Could you please share the lot numbers on those packets? 😞

1389

I also had lot 1558, and it grew red tomatoes instead of Honey Salvation 😞

Everywhere I look, people are leaving the absolute best reviews about this tomato’s flavor, even though I realize it doesn’t exactly spoil you with heavy yields. I actually got the complete opposite result. The yield was great, but the flavor felt a bit bland/empty to me. But I should note that for some reason, all my yellow varieties tasted a bit bland this year.

My Honey Salvation looked more like kidneys, almost elongated even. Absolutely loved the flavor, dense and sweet. Indet, but definitely not scrawnyб the vines were tall, vigorous, huge internodes, large leaves pointing downwards…

I just did an image search and I’m starting to suspect that a lot of us are growing entirely different varieties 😂, and I can’t even vouch for my own being correct 😞. I had seeds from 2 sources – a commercial SibSad packet and another one I ordered… let me think… I believe from Natalya Borzykh. My memory is slipping 😂, and my notes are at home. I can’t even remember which ones sprouted during the seedling stage. But both of my vines ended up looking identical.

Ninochka, judging by the shape, yours look like SibSad’s Southern Tan (Yuzhny Zagar) or Golden Königsberg. Though my Southern Tan had smaller seed locules, it was basically just solid buttery flesh inside.

Nina, that is definitely not Medovyi Spas, the only thing they have in common is the color 🤫

My Honey Salvation.

Sveta, my lower clusters had kidney-shaped fruits, but higher up they looked more like yours – round.

Galya 👏 we need to send all our tasty but low-yielding varieties to you for re-education!

Zulfiya said:
Ninochka, yours look more like Southern Tan…

Nah, it’s not Southern Tan. I grew that one this year too. It doesn’t taste as good, and the vine acts more like a determinate – maxed out at maybe 4 ft (1.2-1.3 m). The fruits are a different color too.

Here they are.

Galya, I don’t remember if the fruits on my Medovyi Spas varied much, haven’t grown it in a few years, but honestly, all heart/kidney varieties have variable fruit shapes, you never get two that are perfectly identical.

Your yield, as always, is super 👍

Fruits on Honey Salvation can vary a bit even on the same vine, but it definitely shouldn’t have a pointy beak on the end. At least mine didn’t.

They do look like Golden Königsberg, especially the taste, but that vine wasn’t very tall either, and yielded less. Though I think I grew that way back in ’13.

Nina, yeah, that is definitely not Medovyi Spas. 😞

My Monastic Meal (Monastyrskaya Trapeza) turned out totally wrong this year: heart-shaped with red marbling on top. Beautiful, but still a seed mix-up. This is exactly why I’m getting sick of trying new things. It’s either a mix-up or just a duplicate of something else. 😢

Don’t know about the vine habit, but your fruits look exactly like Golden Königsberg.

Grew 2 vines of Medovyi Spas in 2015, one on the sunny side of the greenhouse and one near the door. The one in the sun had fewer fruits, but they were larger and ripened early. The vine by the door was absolutely loaded, but the fruits were smaller and ripened later. Growing it for the 3rd year from the same packet (SibSad).

Now that is the real deal right there. 👍

My Medovyi Spas from 2015. Growing it for the second year. Originally got a seedling from an elderly neighbor lady. She’s been growing this variety for ages and saves her own seed. The tomatoes are perfectly round, neat, sweet, and delicious. Really love this variety.

Zulfiya said:
I’m dreaming of finding the perfect yellow-orange variety: early like Ashgabat Heart, incredibly sweet like Honey Salvation, heavy yielding like Amana Orange, and bulletproof against cracking and disease like Orange German Strawberry.

Zulfiya, whenever you finally find that variety, whisper the name to me, please! 📝

Anika said:
The tomatoes are perfectly round, neat, sweet, and delicious. Really love this variety.

My Medovyi Spas was a completely different shape… they were hearts. The color matches, yellow-orange. True, I took the photo while they were still green… but I remember the ripe color well. Grew it once and kind of forgot about it… so many new varieties came out… but I remember for a fact it was delicious!

I grew Medovyi Spas in a poly tunnel. Didn’t get very tall (about 5 ft / 1.5 m). Yield was average. Fruits were very delicious with fruity notes. Sweet and very few seeds.

My Medovyi Spas… Same as Ilya’s… Vine is on the shorter side, average yields, excellent taste 😋

My absolute favorite variety because it has zero acid and buttery flesh. Always gives me a good crop. I grow it outdoors. Original seeds were SibSad, but I’ve been saving my own for a long time.

A very delicious tomato; sweet, buttery, stores well. Will definitely repeat it using my own saved seeds, hoping for a better yield next time around.

Loved the flavor, but the yield was pretty low. Will repeat it in 2018.

I liked the taste, but the cons outweighed the pros for me. For some reason, it gave me a terrible yield and cracked heavily (even though not a single other variety in the greenhouse cracked). Also didn’t like that it refuses to store. Well, maybe I just don’t have the magic touch for this one 🤷‍♀️

Good tomato, lacked just a tiny bit of sweetness for my taste, but I can’t help comparing every orange variety to Orange Strawberry and Fox Nose. Overall, it loses out to them.

Medovyi Spas can sit on the counter for quite a while without losing flavor. In fact, it gets even better.

Grew Medovyi Spas in 2019. SibSad seeds. Fully matches the description. Only 2 fruits on the whole plant caught BER. Grew 1 vine in the greenhouse. Pulled 5.5 lbs (2.5 kg) off it, with fruits weighing between 3.5 and 11 oz (100 to 308 g). Average fruit weight was around 7-9 oz (200-250 g). Attached a photo and video.

I grow 1-2 vines of Medovyi Spas almost every year. The vine is scrawny, fruits are orange and kidney-shaped. Extremely delicious, no acid, very sweet, buttery on the inside. Didn’t crack for me, and they store well. Especially in the fall when you let them ripen off the vine in a cool place.

Since this strain was bred by Siberian breeders, it tastes incredible here in Siberia. Yield is average. This year I sowed the last three seeds from a SibSad packet and successfully grew Honey Salvation alongside an Orange Truffle. SibSad definitely has a serious problem with seed mix-ups.

Poltava. Outdoors in the dirt. I usually prune it to 2-3 leaders. The vine stays around 4 ft (1.2 m) tall. Fruit set is good. It has an amazing habit of growing larger fruits on the upper trusses, and the shape changes from hearts at the bottom to more rounded up top.

Fruits are dense with very few seeds, the texture reminds me of a persimmon, no hard fibrous cores. Looks yellow in the photo, but in reality, it leans much closer to orange. One of the best-tasting tomatoes out there.

Mid-season, keeps producing right up until frost. Ripens fine off the vine.

It’s got a permanent spot in my garden.

Edited February 12, 2023 by Valentina-11