Grow Your Own Tomatoes. Your Own Harvest of Paradise Fruits Tastes the Best!
Tomatoes arrived in our lands through Spain in the 16th century in connection with exploratory voyages. Their homeland is South America, probably Mexico. Local inhabitants were enjoying tomatoes there long before the beginning of our calendar. In Europe, people initially viewed them with suspicion and considered them an ornamental plant. Tomatoes found their way onto plates much later.
Tomato is Originally a Perennial
In South America, you can still find the ancestors of today's tomatoes from the nightshade family in the wild. These are lush, abundantly branching, creeping plants with small fruits about the size of currants or small cherries. In our region, tomatoes are grown as annuals because they are sensitive to frost. However, in their homeland, they can grow as perennials.
Wild tomatoes have been reaching us in recent years as a growing curiosity. They are very undemanding and resilient. If they are damaged by disease or pests, they easily regrow. The tiny fruits are tasty, but their harvest is quite time-consuming, and the miniature tomatoes tend to crack a lot. However, especially for children, such a tomato is a great experience. Today's cherry tomato varieties (e.g., Lupitas F1) are among the closest descendants created by breeding wild tomatoes.
Is Tomato a Vegetable or a Fruit?
Most people probably automatically classify tomatoes as vegetables. However, disputes on this topic have been ongoing for more than 100 years, and it's still not entirely clear. In fact, in a court case from the late 19th century in the USA, the tomato was declared a vegetable. But the European Union confused everyone when, in 2001, it explicitly classified tomatoes as fruit–but only for the purposes of jam production. The question of the general classification of tomatoes as fruit or vegetable thus remains unresolved.
Tomatoes are Healthy
Tomatoes contain primarily vitamin C, but also A, B1, B6, folic acid, magnesium, and many other important elements. In connection with tomatoes, there is much talk about the health-beneficial lycopene, which contains vitamin A. Lycopene from tomatoes is better utilized by the body after heat treatment, although this reduces the vitamin C content. Therefore, tomatoes are recommended to be consumed both raw and cooked or baked. Tomato skins are also healthy. In Native American healing practices, tomato juice is used externally for skin inflammations. In our region, you can find it in some cosmetic products, where it is supposed to reduce wrinkles and age spots.
Tomatoes in the Kitchen
- Don't put tomatoes in the fridge, their flavour would suffer.
- Store them stem-side up at room temperature and use within a few days.
- Process surplus harvest into ketchups and purées or you can also dry them.
- Don't freeze tomatoes, they would lose both flavour and texture.
Cordon or Bush Types?
Usually, cordon varieties (e.g. Aurea F1) are grown in gardens, which are tied to supports. They are characterised by a continuously growing main stem. Bush tomatoes (e.g. Philovita, Roma) have a determinate growth habit terminated by a flower cluster, with the plant continuing to grow through additional side shoots. You can choose a specific variety according to colour (shades of red, orange, yellow, purple, green, black), according to shape (round, plum, pear-shaped, cherry, date-shaped, etc.), but also according to characteristics determined by the flesh type (for salads, for ketchups, for stuffing, beefsteak, for drying, etc.).
What Seeds to Choose?
Great attention should be paid to seed selection. Breeding has not only led to different colours and shapes of fruit. Plants can also vary greatly in their characteristics, disease resistance and growing requirements. With quality seeds, you can be sure that if you provide the tomato with suitable growing conditions, you won't be disappointed with the results.
Principles of a Rich Tomato Harvest
- Tomatoes need warmth, a sunny location, nutrient-rich soil, and watering during dry days.
- In cold areas, it's better to grow tomatoes in a greenhouse or polytunnel.
- For pre-growing your own seedlings at home by the window, sow seeds from February to March.
- Plant tomatoes outside only after the last frost.
- Plant seedlings deeper in the ground, even with the lower leaves, this will support the development of a rich root system.
- Tomatoes cannot do without fertilization; in autumn, it's recommended to dig manure into the beds. When planting, you can use granulated manure or compost, during the growing season watering with fertilizer has proven effective (first Kristalon START until the beginning of flowering, then Kristalon PLOD a KVĚT).
- Mulch the bed with non-woven fabric, chopped straw, or mown grass.
- Cordon varieties need to be regularly tied to stakes and side shoots growing from leaf axils manually pinched out (using scissors risks disease transmission).
- With bush varieties, you don't need to remove side shoots. Shoots bearing fruit are better supported. They often bend to the ground under the weight of the fruit and tomatoes may start to rot.
- Never water tomatoes on the leaves, as they suffer from late blight and the risk of infection increases with high humidity. You can recognize it by typical brown spots on leaves, stems, and fruits. Preventively, you can use products like Acrobat, Ridomil, Kuprikol, etc. If blight breaks out, reach for Dithane. If you're not a fan of chemicals in your garden, opt for Bioton or Bioan.
- With heavy fruit set on cordon tomatoes, it's better to reduce them, thereby increasing the probability that the remaining fruits will ripen in time. Pinch the plant after the seventh or eighth truss.
Why Do Supermarket Tomatoes Have No Taste?
If you have the opportunity, grow your own tomatoes. Nicely in the sun in nutrient-rich soil. They may not be as beautiful as those from the store, but they will definitely taste better. Industrially grown tomatoes usually grow in giant greenhouses in infertile substrates fed only with fertilizer solution. Specially bred varieties are used that spoil slowly but lag behind in taste.
And good news for those without a garden too - you can grow tomatoes on your balcony! You can try regular staking varieties planted in large grow bags, or choose very undemanding bush varieties labeled as balcony tomatoes. They have a lower or trailing growth habit and are specially bred to thrive in window boxes and smaller containers.