Quick Summary of Razbitoe Serdechko (Broken Heart)
- 🌍 Origin: A Russian heirloom variety favored by collectors. The name translates to “Broken Heart”, referencing the slightly asymmetrical or uniquely shaped pink oxheart fruits.
- 🌿 Plant Habit: Indeterminate (vining) but often reported as staying relatively short (about 1.5 m / 5 ft). Like many classic oxheart varieties, the plant has a spindly, “wispy” appearance and can sometimes terminate its own growth early. It tolerates light shade well.
- 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: Beautiful raspberry-pink, elongated heart-shaped tomatoes, often slightly slanted to one side. Average weight is around 150-200 grams (5-7 oz). They have very few seeds.
- 👅 Flavor: Highly praised for being sweet, meaty, and thin-skinned. Note: In extreme heatwaves, fruits can develop tough white veins and “yellow shoulders,” which negatively affects the flavor, making them better suited for processing.
- ⏳ Maturity & Yield: Mid-early season. It is generally a heavy yielder, blooming profusely and setting large clusters of fruit if weather permits.
Seeds are from Nadezhda (Nadine). The description is as follows:
Mid-early maturity, tall. Fruits are shaped like elongated hearts, weighing up to 200 grams (7 oz). A productive variety with beautiful, tasty raspberry-pink fruits and a small number of seeds.
I grew two bushes—one in the greenhouse and one outdoors. I agree with the description, except that in my conditions it was mid-season. The shape is very beautiful.
I also planted one bush from Nadine this year. For some reason, mine only “got into high gear” towards the end of August. Otherwise, the description matched perfectly. I absolutely loved the taste!!!!
I am very pleased with this variety. It turned out to be mid-early. Tasty, meaty, thin-skinned, and it has a beautiful name 🙂.
My seeds for Broken Heart are from Seryozha Firsov. For me, it was mid-early, productive; small pink hearts, very tasty.
Here are photos from 2014, and these two grew fused together… And from 2015.
I have more photos—here is the bush (or rather half a bush, view from the bottom, the upper trusses are not visible) from last year, and on the scale from this year.
The bush is thin and spindly. The fruits are small pink hearts, slightly slanted to one side. The plant is productive, and the fruits are tasty. Seeds from Nadine.
Girls, how tall does the bush grow in a greenhouse? Will it tolerate light shade if I plant it against the wall in the second row?
Lena, mine was about 1.5 m (5 ft), maybe even a bit smaller (in the greenhouse), and it grew in light shade.
This year, the variety grew outdoors for me, seeds from Redko. It turned out tasty, dense, mid-early, and quite productive. In appearance, exactly like in Nadezhda’s last three photos.
I think the variety has great potential. It bloomed like crazy, the trusses are large, there are a lot of them, and they are spaced closely together, but due to severe weather fluctuations, it couldn’t set many fruit. I will definitely grow it again.
I planted two bushes in the greenhouse under different conditions—one in the shade and one in the sun. The bushes were short and thin, and they somehow topped themselves early on. It set fruit well and in large quantities. It turned out to be mid-early. Tasty little hearts, slightly elongated, meaty. Productive. I will definitely grow it again.
salix (Iva) said:
I think the variety has great potential. It bloomed like crazy… I will definitely grow it again.
I also want to plant it outdoors (in a light hoop house) since it stays so short. Iva! How many stems did you let it grow into outdoors? How did you prune it?
Elena, I didn’t prune it heavily; it ended up growing into three stems, and I only removed the weakest suckers. But this season it performed worse—the yield was quite small, it took a very long time to set fruit, and then they hung green for ages without ripening.
Seeds from Seryozha Firsov. I really, really liked this little tomato. In my difficult year, almost all my seedlings died. Only a few survived, including Broken Heart. Beautiful, productive, tasty. I’m not saving seeds from it though; there is leaf mold (Cladosporium) in my greenhouse.
Galya, you can still save seeds even if you have leaf mold (Cladosporium). It is not transmitted through the seeds.
My Broken Heart didn’t like the abnormally hot summer this year. It grew in a polycarbonate greenhouse right in the blistering heat. It bloomed abundantly and set a lot of fruit. It turned out quite early. BUT! In the heat, it developed tough veins and yellow shoulders. Because of this, the taste was bland 😢😩. After trimming away the bad parts, it went strictly for sauce and juice.
