GARDENING : Time Is Ripe for Heirloom Tomato Comeback

A funny thing is happening to tomatoes. Taste is back, at least in some varieties destined for growing in home gardens. Apparently people insisted, and seed suppliers listened.

Unfortunately, most people under the age of 50 won’t understand why. They’ve eaten only the bland offerings found in supermarket produce departments. Now Brandywines and other heirloom types are making a comeback.

Seeds have always been available from specialty firms such as Tomato Growers Supply Co. Heirloom-preservation groups, such as Seed Savers Exchange, also had them.

But the inherent problem of Brandywine and similar heirloom types--they just can’t be transported any distance--kept them out of the mainstream.

Contrast that to this report on Brandywine from the 1994 catalogue of Johnny’s Seeds, a major distributor: “Is this Amish heirloom the best-tasting tomato? We have not tasted better.”

Rob Johnson Jr., chairman of Johnny’s, says Brandywine is one of seven heirlooms being carried for the first time, in 1994.

“I realized that all of us working on tomato development at Johnny’s had been too rigid and conventional in our standards--that the ideal tomato was firm, globe-shaped, red and grew on a compact plant. Look at all we had been missing!”

Johnson says he became convinced that consumers were being shortchanged “because the need of produce handlers for durability tends to contradict good taste features.”

Stokes Seeds, another major supplier, was even firmer: “Taste has still been completely forgotten by most plant breeders in the 1990s. . . . During the 1930s, all tomatoes tasted great because most tomatoes were picked field-ripe and not shipped a long distance to market.”

Stokes’ offerings include heirloom-type Vendor tomatoes.

Both Johnny’s and Stokes offer free catalogues.

Sources for Tomato Seeds

* Tomato Growers Supply Co., P.O. Box 2237, Ft. Myers, Fla., 33902.

* Seed Savers Exchange, Decorah, Iowa, 52101.

* Johnny’s Seeds, Foss Hill Road, Albion, Me., 04910.

* Stokes Seeds, Box 548, Buffalo, N.Y., 14240.