📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Calabrese Gigante
- 🌍 Origin: A fantastic heirloom tomato originating from the Calabria region in southern Italy.
- 🌿 Plant Habit: Indeterminate (tall). Very productive and boasts a long harvest window, often producing well into the fall.
- 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: Deep red, slightly elongated (almost giant plum or pear-shaped) beefsteaks with light ribbing at the shoulders. They are massive, often weighing between 1.1 to 1.5 lbs (500–700 g) or more. Very dense, meaty, and known for having an excellent shelf life once picked.
- ⏳ Maturity: Mid-season.
- 👅 Flavor: A rich, well-balanced traditional tomato flavor that heavily leans towards the sweet side.
🍅 Grown this variety? Click here to add your own photos and review below!
Grower Reviews & Photos
Another giant from Italy! Indet, mid-season maturity, grew it in the greenhouse and pruned it to 2 stems.
The dense, meaty fruits have a rich, well-balanced flavor (sweetness was the dominant note for me). They have a slight ribbing, are somewhat elongated, and take on a deep, saturated red hue as they ripen. These tomatoes hold their flavor and market quality (shelf life) for a very long time.
Large fruits, reaching up to 1.1–1.5 lbs (500–700 g) and even more. It kept producing all the way until mid-September. Seeds from Natalya Drazhakova.
Edited February 8, 2023 by Gavrik
👨🌾 Editor’s Note on Fruit Shape:
Unlike perfectly round beefsteaks or sharp oxhearts, this variety produces slightly elongated, heavily ribbed fruits (often called “piriform” or pear-shaped beefsteaks). This morphology is a classic hallmark of old southern Italian heirlooms. Because these shapes traditionally contain less water and denser meat, they serve a fantastic dual purpose: they are incredibly sweet and juicy for fresh slicing, but can also be cooked down into thick, world-class pasta sauces (passata) very quickly!
Unlike perfectly round beefsteaks or sharp oxhearts, this variety produces slightly elongated, heavily ribbed fruits (often called “piriform” or pear-shaped beefsteaks). This morphology is a classic hallmark of old southern Italian heirlooms. Because these shapes traditionally contain less water and denser meat, they serve a fantastic dual purpose: they are incredibly sweet and juicy for fresh slicing, but can also be cooked down into thick, world-class pasta sauces (passata) very quickly!
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