Crushed Heart Tomato Reviews & Photos

CRUSHED HEART by Brad Gates. To me, the name doesn’t mean “wounded”, “broken”, or “shattered”, but rather a Heart IN LOVE (like having a crush)!

This variety with a romantic name is one of my absolute favorites when it comes to color and shape. The plant itself falls into the slender/wispy category with typical drooping leaves. It loves light; if planted too densely, the yield suffers. I had up to 5 tomatoes per truss, and it absolutely requires tying/staking. The average weight of the fruits was around 200g (7 oz). I pruned it to two stems.

Edited September 6, 2017 by Drosera

I got my seeds for this variety from Redko. It is not only beautiful but also very tasty and meaty. My yield was a bit low—I planted it way too densely. It’s on my favorites list now, I will definitely be repeating it.

Just WOOWWW, what a beauty! 👏👏👏

Quoting Irina:
My yield was a bit low—I planted it way too densely.

I made the exact same mistake this year. I planted it too densely in the third row; it really needed more space and light. I absolutely loved the taste, too. Very few seeds, dense, yet juicy.

Quoting Lelikovna:
Just WOOWWW, what a beauty!

I’m waiting for the next truss to ripen, and if I can manage to reach in there with my camera, I’ll take a picture. Every single one is a stunner!

Quoting Alisa:
If I can manage to reach in there with my camera, I’ll take a picture.

Alisa, you definitely need to try and reach in there so you can treat the forum members to some beauty!

Here is how my “Smitten Heart” grew:

It didn’t do very well for me because it suffered for a long time as a seedling in the cold with daily frosts. The growing tips on both bushes got damaged, so replacement shoots started growing. I left them in 2 and 3 stems. It grew to 1.6 m (5.2 ft) in the greenhouse. The tomatoes turned out a bit misshapen, consisting of several fused segments—one even grew looking like a “bird” 😂. But I really loved the variety for its beauty and taste. I will repeat it next year. Sadly, there are very few seeds in the fruits 😞

These are the hearts that grew on my upper trusses.

A super variety! It took a long time to germinate, and the seedling was wimpy and scrawny, but after planting it out (in a bright, sunny spot), it really started to shine! Tasty, meaty, and productive. 😍

Girls, this beauty is indescribable. It’s probably time for me to add it to my wish list. But I just didn’t quite get it—is this variety a “black” tomato?

Quoting Elena 62:
Is this variety a “black” tomato?

No, it’s a mottled/striped pink. The purple shoulders (anthocyanin) only appear when exposed to direct sunlight.

Here is what mine looks like at full ripeness.

Mine definitely wasn’t a dark/black tomato either (seeds from Redko). The color was exactly like Alisa’s in the first photo.

Except mine had purple splashing—sometimes on the shoulders, sometimes in streaks. Beautiful, tasty, and productive.

Another discovery of the 2017 season! This variety didn’t just turn out to be unusually beautiful, but it absolutely blew me away with the taste of its sweet, dense flesh! Height was 1.7m (5.5 ft), fruit weight 200g. It bounced back from a frost by pushing out suckers. I pruned it to 2 stems and grew it outdoors in the open ground. I fell deeply in love with it! Had light traces of antho on the shoulders.

Edited December 13, 2017 by Danko

Completely in love with its beauty and taste!

Productive, delicious, and stores very well—easily lasts 3 weeks.

I don’t quite get why some of us translate it as “Smitten” or “In Love”? Doesn’t the English word “Crushed” mean smashed or broken? Oh well, I’m just a regular user, the nuances of translation escape me.

I got my seeds from Lidia, a huge thanks to her! 🌺 Her description:

Indeterminate variety, mid-season maturity, up to 1.8m tall (about 1.2m outdoors). Produces rich, semi-sweet, meaty heart-shaped fruits. Crimson with gold stripes, weighing 300-400g. During the cold and rainy Moscow summer of 2017, the variety proved to be productive and resistant to Late Blight. Grown outdoors, showing it is adapted to extreme conditions.

A gorgeous tomato! Very productive. The flavor is a rich tomato taste, sweet, but with just a tiny hint of acidity. I grew it in a polycarbonate greenhouse and in a plastic hoop house. In the hoop house, the tomatoes got hit by a frost in May. They recovered, but lost time. In the polycarbonate, Crushed Heart was an early producer; in the hoop house, it was late. But the yield was magnificent in both. The taste, too.

Quoting Yulia:
Doesn’t the English word “Crushed” mean smashed or broken?

In English, having a “crush” on someone means being smitten or secretly in love. Someone who doesn’t know English idioms might be just as surprised and wonder what love has to do with smashing things.

I feel like “Broken Heart” sounds much more natural in Russian. We don’t really say “a heart in love.” A person can be in love, not a heart.

Quoting Olvia:
I feel like “Broken Heart” sounds much more natural in Russian.

I agree, I think “broken” or “shattered” makes much more sense in this case.

I received seeds for this tomato from Kulik under the translated name “Wounded Heart.”

A beautiful, tall tomato variety by Brad Gates. The fruits are stunning, heart-shaped, medium-sized, crimson-colored with striping. Sometimes there is a purple anthocyanin splash near the stem. Juicy-meaty, sweet, and aromatic.

Here is how mine turned out. Tasty, meaty, practically seedless. But the whole bush only set 5 fruits total. Still, I plan to plant it again next year.

I grew two bushes of Crushed Heart. Seeds from Kulik. Both of them turned out rather short (just a bit over a meter), and the yield on them was modest. However, the tomatoes were delicious and extremely beautiful.

I want to repeat it just for the taste, so right now I’m waiting for seeds of these hearts from a more productive source.

A wonderful variety, my love forever! It has it all—yield, beauty, and taste.

I grew three bushes in the greenhouse, pruned to two stems, and all were highly productive. Two of them reached the roof of the greenhouse and fruited for a long time. I topped the third one early, at about 1.2m (4 ft)—it was so heavily loaded with fruit at the bottom that the top struggled to set, producing only single fruits. Few seeds, and the flesh is jelly-like with a distinct sweetness. It’s for true gourmets, I absolutely love this flavor profile.

Edited January 4, 2019 by Svetikk

This tomato is a stunner even when it’s green! A surprisingly successful variety—productive, tasty, and stores quite well once ripe.

Productive and very tasty, sweet. Weight is 200g (7 oz) and under.

Edited July 31, 2019 by Irina Fedorova

The shapes are all very different. The first 2 photos are the wrong ones, I don’t know how to delete them.

Edited July 31, 2019 by Irina Fedorova

Good afternoon everyone!

I grew this variety in the greenhouse, and it produced as many tomatoes as it could… fruit set on the first 3 trusses, the shape is absolutely beautiful.

This variety is a real looker and absolutely delicious! It was one of the very first to ripen outdoors. It was highly productive! I just want to talk about it using exclamation points. It’s staying with me forever. Thanks to Nadyusha (@Nadyusha) for it.

I grew it for the first time. The seeds were from a collector. I loved it. Sometimes Nature really outdoes herself! Taste, beauty, and yield—all combined in one variety.

I grew this wonderful variety again. It didn’t let me down even in this terrible summer.

Poltava. Open ground.

In 2019, Late Blight completely wiped out my entire garden. The only ones left unharmed were Amethyst Jewel and Crushed Heart.

2020. Densely planted. Grown in 2, 3, and 4 stems. Fruits up to 300g (10.5 oz) and more. Very tasty. Not always perfectly heart-shaped. This year some had little star-like rays/lobes, resembling stars or flowers. They were the first to start ripening, and they fruited until the frosts. They got especially delicious in the second half of summer and autumn. They are still storing and ripening indoors as we speak.

Photo taken 12/21/20.

Mine segregated (off-types). Part of the bushes had pear-shaped tomatoes with antho shoulders, and the other part had striped, pointy hearts with no antho at all. The pears started ripening first.

Alternatively, a stray seed of “Blue Pear” might have just gotten mixed into my Crushed Heart packet.

A stunner, a hard worker, and delicious… but he was quite the naughty one too 😂

And it gave me the very first ripe fruit of this season.

On 11/2/2022 at 16:42, Natalya79 said:
A stunner, a hard worker, and delicious… but he was quite the naughty one too 😂

Ooooh, what a cheeky tomato 😂 You must have been walking back and forth past it in your swimsuit!

Here is my “Wounded” heart.

I refreshed my seeds this year. The plant is not too tall, up to 2m (6.5 ft), and slender. The fruits are beautiful and delicious. The color on mine turned out a bit blurred, not very sharply defined. Productive.