Heirloom Tomato Varieties & Reviews | Tomat-Pomidor
Honest reviews of global tomato varieties from a 15-year-old growers community.
📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Verna 🌍 Origin: A fantastic Eastern European heirloom variety. Seeds are widely passed around among collectors (like Lena Danko mentioned in this thread). 🌿 Plant Habit: Indeterminate (tall). It’s a mid-season variety that does great in a greenhouse or hoop house. Growers recommend pruning it to 2 or 3 main stems … Read more
📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Volf Zossi (Wolf Zossi) 🌍 Origin: A variety originating from Germany. It was introduced to the Russian heirloom community by seed collector Vyacheslav Feldman. 🌿 Plant Habit: Indeterminate (tall), regular leaf (RL), mid-season maturity. Growers report it yields very well when pruned to 2 or 3 stems. 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: Large, … Read more
📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Vashe Velichestvo (Your Majesty) 🌍 Origin: A commercial variety from the Siberian breeder “Altai Seeds”. It is officially listed in the Russian State Register. The name translates to “Your Majesty”. 🌿 Plant Habit: Indeterminate (tall). It has classic “oxheart” characteristics, meaning the plant is spindly and flimsy with very thin, wispy … Read more
📌 Quick Summary: White Cherry (Belaya Vishnya) 🌱 Plant Habit: A tall indeterminate vine. It exhibits the classic “wispy” or frail-looking foliage that is typical of most oxheart varieties. 🍅 Fruit & Yield: Despite the “cherry” in its name, this is NOT a cherry tomato. It produces large, pale cream/white heart-shaped tomatoes weighing 9 to … Read more
📌 Quick Summary: Yellow Vernissage 🌍 Origin: Bred by the well-known Ukrainian breeder Ruslan Dukhov, part of his famous “Vernissage” series of striped tomatoes. 🌱 Plant Habit: A massive, sprawling, highly vigorous indeterminate vine. It requires aggressive pruning and sturdy trellising, otherwise, it will completely take over your greenhouse. 🍅 Fruit & Yield: A classic … Read more
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📌 Quick Summary: Creamsicle Grape 🌍 Origin: A relatively new US release, bred by Brad Gates at Wild Boar Farms. 🌱 Plant Habit: A vigorous, tall-growing indeterminate vine that can easily reach over 6.5 ft (2.0 m) in height. Highly productive and known for excellent fruit set. 🍅 Fruit & Yield: Produces elongated “grape” or … Read more
📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Babushkin Potseluy (Grandma’s Kiss) 🌍 Origin: A commercial Russian variety from the “Semena Altaya” (Seeds of Altai) company, part of their Siberian Collection. The name translates to “Grandma’s Kiss”. 🌿 Plant Habit: Potato Leaf (PL) foliage. There seems to be significant genetic variability regarding its height. It is officially listed as … Read more
📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Belyi Velikan (White Giant) 🌍 Origin: A Russian heirloom variety. The name translates to “White Giant”. 🌿 Plant Habit: Indeterminate and highly productive. It reliably sets heavy clusters, typically pushing out 5 to 6 large fruits per truss. 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: Large, ivory-white to pale yellow beefsteaks. The shape is noticeably … Read more
📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Big Orange Stripe 🌍 Origin: A beautiful heirloom known in the Russian community as “Bolshoy Oranzhevyi Polosatyi”. 🌿 Plant Habit: Indeterminate, regular leaf, mid-season. It grows into a massive, vigorous plant easily reaching 6 ft (1.8 m) and taller. Growers usually prune it to 1 or 2 leaders. 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: … Read more
📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): White Zebra 🌍 Origin: A novelty striped variety (originally developed by Tom Wagner in the US, widely circulated in Eastern Europe). 🌿 Plant Habit: Indeterminate. Highly reliable. Growers report excellent fruit set even in bad weather years when other varieties drop their blossoms. 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: Small-to-medium round salad/cocktail tomatoes. When … Read more
📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Balkoni Elo (Balcony Yellow) F1 🌍 Origin: A commercial container variety sold by the Russian seed company “Biotechnika”. Interesting Note: While marketed in Russia as an F1 Hybrid, European growers regularly save seeds and get perfectly uniform plants, proving it is actually an OP (Open-Pollinated) variety. Just a classic seed company … Read more
📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Bychye Serdtse Beloye (White Oxheart) 🌍 Origin: A Russian/Eastern European strain of the classic White Oxheart. Note: Like almost all “white” tomatoes, it is not pure paper-white; it ripens to a pale lemon-yellow or ivory, sometimes developing a slight pinkish blush or orange marbling at the blossom end when fully ripe. … Read more