Twelve Heirloom Tomato Varieties You Should Try

Twelve Heirloom Tomato Varieties You Should Try

In the last few years, I have had the pleasure of growing and tasting well over 100 varieties of tomatoes. Here are a few family favorites that have earned their spot and became a staple of our yearly garden.

Almost all of my tomatoes I typically start from seed. Through the years, my favorite go-to seed companies have become: Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds, Pinetree Garden Seeds and Seed Saver’s Exchange. Baker Creek is known for their stunning photography of almost every variety they sell. They are a great place to start for a visual understanding of the gorgeous colors available in heirloom garden goodies. Pinetree Garden Seeds has a packet size and price that allows you to justify trying several different things while keeping to your budget and not breaking the bank. Seed Saver’s Exchange is the place to look if you can’t find the variety anywhere else. All three offer a free mail-order catalog worth getting even if only for the education alone. (I am not connected with any of the seed companies listed above—in any way—other than being a loyal customer for over a decade.)

Before we start looking at individual varieties, let’s take a look at ripening styles. Tomatoes come either determinate or indeterminate. Most modern varieties are determinate. The entire crop ripens at the same time. This is great for commercial processors, but not for a family garden. It’s feast or famine! Indeterminate tomatoes ripen with a one now and one later approach. So a small patch will let you pick a few tomatoes daily over several weeks.

I have found that some varieties do well during some summers and not so well during other years. Flavor also varies greatly by soil nutrients and planting location. The tastiest tomatoes always seem to be the ones grown by my dad. His secret—lots of cow manure, a heavy clay soil and straw mulch! If you decide to try any of these varieties, I recommend trying them for a few years in a row before writing any of them off. I have grown some of these and thought they were flavorless, until they were grown by the hands of my father.

Pink Oxheart
A beautiful heart-shaped, pink, indeterminate tomato that weighs between 16-32 ounces. It is a very mild tasting tomato with minimal seeds. It is great fresh and slices up well with lots of visual appeal. For those of you that like fried green tomatoes, it’s definitely one of the best! Being a meaty tomato, it holds up well to frying and grilling even when ripe. It’s also great on sandwiches. 80 days Heirloom

White Cherry
This is one of my husband’s top picks and one of the best types for snacking. It is a pale almost translucent, light lemon-colored cherry tomato. This small 1 inch tomato has a very refreshing, full-bodied, sweet-tart flavor. It is an indeterminate variety. 80 days Heirloom

Black Prince
This is a nice personal-sized tomato coming in at around 3 to 5 ounces. It is a very uniform indeterminate tomato looking great on and off the plant. It is outstanding in the taste department with a complex flavor: sweet tangy and rich with just a hint of saltiness. Truly one of the finest of the black tomato varieties. 70 days Heirloom

Gold Medal
This tomato comes with tons of color while giving up nothing in the flavor and texture categories. It is a very large-sized indeterminate variety weighing over 1 pound each. This bright orange and yellow bi-color with a heavy splash of red is a beauty to behold. The flavor is superb and it has won several taste testing awards. 75 days Heirloom

Black Brandywine
An indeterminate variety producing large dark mahogany fruit with a dark rich flesh. Excellent for salads, fresh sliced tomatoes and fantastic for making salsa. This is one of my favorite to can for soups and chilies, allowing me to bring the taste of summer into my winter menu. This is a potato leaf variety so the plant has a unique look. 80-90 days Heirloom

Super Fantastic
This is my favorite early planting tomato. I normally plant it deep in the soil shortly after the ground can be worked. I cover them with 5 gallon buckets at night, banking the dirt around the sides. During the day when the temperatures are up, I uncover the plants. This might seem like a lot of work, but hey—nothing beats winning the extended families’ “earliest tomato from the garden” contest or having fresh tomatoes picked straight from the garden by the 4th of July! Unlike other early tomatoes this one keeps on producing well all season long. I believe this to be a hybrid in most cases, but have seen it also sold as an heirloom. There seems to be several variations of the name. It is a medium-sized, red, slightly meaty tomato with a good classic tomato flavor. Indeterminate 70 days

German Lunchbox
This is one of my daughter’s favorites. A small egg-shaped, vibrant pink tomato with a sweet, very mild almost bland flavor. This easy to grow, indeterminate variety is perfect for children’s gardens. It holds up well packed in lunches and is a nice addition to any salad. Definitely one of the more true pink colored tomatoes of the pink varieties. 70-80 days Heirloom

Amish Paste
My go-to tomato for you guessed it: sauces and ketchup. A sweet tasting 8-12 ounce blocky roma-type tomato that can vary slightly in shape. Some people enjoy this as a slicing tomato, though most of mine normally end up making their way into the sauce pot for spaghetti night. One of the more well known and liked of the paste tomatoes, its thick texture and full bodied taste can’t be beat in pasta sauce or ketchup recipes. It is an indeterminate variety. 80 days Heirloom

Matt’s Wild Cherry
This very small bright red cherry tomato is rather time consuming to pick, but well worth the effort. Coming in on our list as the smallest tomato at only 5/8 to ¾ inch and growing in clusters of 7-14 tomatoes, it is definitely a favorite in the garden of old and young alike. Probably one of the most candy-tasting of any tomato we have tried. A tiny tomato bursting with a super sweet flavor and a very high sugar content. I have found it true to its name. I often find it growing wild the following year from a fallen tomatoes that manage to escape my toddler. This indeterminate variety is definitely worth a shot and one of the easiest to grow. One of the earliest tomatoes that keeps on producing well right up until frost. 55 days Heirloom

Minibel
This variety is very unique and looks very different from your standard tomato plant. It is a determinate type with plants only reaching about 18 inches in height and resembling a small bush. A favorite for flower beds, small spaces, patio pots, and in children’s gardens. Bite-sized bright fire red fruit are sweet in flavor and loads of fun to pick off of the prolific ornamental plants. A word of caution: Most years these plants have been true to description, but I have had a few plants that decided they wanted to be full sized and grew to be way larger than listed. 65 days Heirloom

Principe Borghese
This is my favorite childhood tomato. A large bright red cherry tomato that is one of the best for drying. Indeterminate plants that bear tomatoes in clusters of 7-10. Fruits retain their superb color and flavor well even when dried. It has a flavor ranking in the medium area, not too bold, but still full-bodied. 80 days Heirloom

Yellow Pear
This is my son’s go-to tomato every year and a must have in his garden! I would consider it a very bland yet sweet tasting tomato. It is bright yellow in color with a unique pear shape reminiscent of the name. The 1 ½ inch fruits are not only fun to pick, but make a great addition to any salad or relish tray. It is definitely one of the most popular and well known of any of the yellow tomato varieties. 80 days Heirloom

Thanks for bearing with me. This post started at 5 varieties, but as you can see it quickly grew to 12 in order to keep the peace in our little nest. This year we hope to challenge the tomatoes on our list as we explore more striped, blueberry and stuffer tomato varieties. I hope you have fun adding color and nutrition to your life while helping keep heirlooms alive with these amazing tomato varieties.

Happy garden planning,

The Homesteading Hen