Quick Summary of Purple Calabash (Фиолетовая тыква)
- 🌍 Origin: A very old and famous heirloom variety known globally as Purple Calabash. It is renowned for its unique, deeply ribbed shape resembling a miniature pumpkin.
- 🌿 Plant Habit: Indeterminate. The plants are extremely rampant and vigorous. Growers report them aggressively pushing out suckers from every possible node (sometimes even from the leaves). They can be grown outdoors or in greenhouses.
- 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: Deeply fluted (heavily ribbed) flat tomatoes with a dark purple, burgundy, or brownish-lilac color. They typically weigh around 150-250g (5.3-8.8 oz), though some growers experience smaller fruits.
- 👅 Flavor: Highly polarizing! Some growers love the juicy, fruity, sweet-and-sour flavor. Others absolutely despise it, comparing it to plain, unseasoned tomato paste or ketchup, and relegate the harvest to the compost pile.
- ⏳ Yield: Generally very high-yielding, producing heavy clusters of highly decorative fruits.
A tall (indeterminate), mid-season variety with unusual fruits resembling small pumpkins… The fruits have a dark lilac color, leaning closer to purple… The flesh of the fruits is juicy, pleasant to the taste, with a slight sweetness… I grew the variety last season in a greenhouse—the bushes have somewhat wispy foliage and can be pruned to 2-3 stems… They are very decorative during the ripening period—these purple little pumpkins hang on the bushes, and they are not too small (150-250 g / 5.3-8.8 oz)… Fabulously beautiful! 👍
Edited January 27, 2015 by Yaroslavna
I had a very powerful plant, but it was also productive. Grew it in a greenhouse.
Mine is growing outdoors in open ground, a very beautiful bush, it was a pity to pick the little pumpkins. I pruned it to two stems, a very productive variety. Thank you Natalia Pavlovna! The seeds were yours.
Last year, I hunted for this variety all winter long….. bought it eventually…. and as luck would have it, it didn’t work out for me…. 🤷♀️ the bush is enormous, but the fruits are completely itsy-bitsy (tiny) …. share your knowledge… what did I do wrong 😔 the color and taste of the fruits I liked 🥰 Reading the reviews I see that I failed with it … 🤔
VALENTINA/Abakan wrote:
Last year, I hunted for this variety all winter long….. bought it eventually…. and as luck would have it, it didn’t work out for me…. 🤷♀️ the bush is enormous, but the fruits are completely itsy-bitsy (tiny) …. share your knowledge… what did I do wrong 😔
Valentina, the fruits of Purple Calabash are naturally not large.
Yeah, I understood that… 😆 I’m talking about people writing that it’s very productive 😔 Mine was clearly not in the mood 😆
VALENTINA/Abakan wrote:
Yeah, I understood that… 😆 I’m talking about people writing that it’s very productive 😔 Mine was clearly not in the mood 😆
Well, in terms of yield, mine was actually very good.
For me, this variety segregated (threw off-types). The fruit shape was identical on all bushes, but the color varied. Some bushes had purple fruits, others had red ones. All were over 2 meters (6.5 ft) tall and aggressively pushed out suckers. The yield was excellent. The fruits are juicy, with fruity notes in the taste and a pleasant acidity.
The bush was of medium height for an indeterminate, 1-1.2m (3.3-4 ft), but very rampant/bushy. VERY. Suckers from everywhere, even out of the leaves. Ripening takes about 110 days from sprouting. Fruit weight approx. 150 g (5.3 oz).
Intended use is slice, i.e., slicing it beautifully for a sandwich. Its taste is the spitting image of tomato ketchup before spices are put into it. For a salad – no. As a main crop variety – also no. Basically, I wouldn’t even put this on a sandwich. I tried a couple, everything else went into the compost – it has poor shelf life, and when you have other tomatoes available, you just don’t want to eat it.
The only variety rejected by my taste-tester dogs 😂 (and believe me, they can tell the difference between Golden apples and other varieties, for example).
