📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Zastolny (Banquet)
- 🌍 Origin: A Russian commercial variety officially registered in 2007 by the RosSortSemOvoshch seed company. The name “Zastolny” loosely translates to “for the banquet table” or “table-ready”.
- 🌿 Plant Habit: Determinate (bush). Very compact and low maintenance. Usually stays around 20 inches (50 cm) tall, though older seeds can produce slightly more vigorous plants up to 3.3 feet (1 m).
- 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: Red, round-to-oval tomatoes with incredibly glossy skin. Standard weight is 2.5-3.2 oz (70-90 g). Standout feature: Extreme density. These tomatoes are rock-hard and boast an unbelievable shelf life.
- 👅 Flavor: Mild and pleasant with a very low acidity. Rated a 4/5 for fresh eating, but its firm structure makes it primarily a top-tier canning and pickling tomato.
The variety was officially registered in 2007. Seeds are from RosSortSemOvoshch. The packet describes it as mid-season and prolific. Other info I dug up online says: 110-115 days to maturity, 20 inches (50 cm) tall, fruit weight 2.5-3.2 oz (70-90 g), and yield around 1.6 lbs per sq ft (8 kg per sq m).
We grew 2 completely low-maintenance bushes. Fruit set was excellent, and they ripen fully on the vine. The fruits are very glossy, and yield was up to 3.3 lbs (1.5 kg) per bush.
The defining characteristic of this variety is its sheer density (it actually took first place for firmness out of the 88 varieties we grew). I literally couldn’t crush one in my fist if I tried. Even the ones I picked green are still sitting in storage right now and haven’t gotten soft or wrinkly like my main varieties do while ripening indoors. I rate the taste a 4 out of 5, very mild acidity.
I decided to repeat this variety from this great seed company. The packet’s expiration date was 4-6 years ago, so I wanted to grow them out to save and refresh my seed stock. Germination was excellent, which means I wasn’t too late. Interestingly, the yield actually increased this time around, which really makes you think that older seeds are actually more productive.
A section of the bush this year stretched past the usual 20 inches (50 cm) and hit about 3.3 feet (1 m) tall.
In Elena’s second post, she notes that her 5+ year old seeds resulted in a larger, heavier-yielding plant, concluding that “older seeds are more productive”. This is actually a very common, long-held belief among older generations of Russian and Eastern European gardeners!
While modern agricultural science argues that fresh seeds have the highest vigor, many traditional heirloom growers intentionally age their tomato and cucumber seeds for 3 to 5 years before planting, swearing that the slight stress of aging alters the epigenetics, causing the plant to produce more “female” blossoms and a heavier fruit set before it dies.
