When most people think of backyard gardening they always think of tomatoes. Growing tomatoes is very personal, talk to anyone who gardens and they have a system for growing and a preferred tomato variety. People have their opinions about the best way to grow, harvest and cook tomatoes.
I’m new at gardening so I don’t have a variety preference or a growing method that I have mastered, yet.
This year here is what I am growing:
- Sun Gold Hybrid. I purchased 2 of these plants from Burpee.
- Super Sweet 100. I grew this plant from seeds purchased from Burpee. I’ve grown this for a few years and just love to cook with these.
- Darkstar Hybrid. Another one plant purchased from Burpee.
- Rutgers Heirloom. I purchased this plant from a local nursery.
I am using cages for all my tomatoes this year. In previous years, I tried to use stakes and smaller cages, but this year I purchased large green tomatoes cages for 3 of of tomatoes and 2 smaller tomatoes cages. The heavy duty cages I purchased are a product I will probably recommend in a future post, but I want to use an entire season before I recommend.
Overall, it has been a successful year in the garden. By early August I have bowls and bowls of tomatoes.
Growing Tomatoes: The Good and The Bad of Summer 2022
I was most excited about the Darkstar hybrid as it is a purple tomato. The tomatoes are very large, the largest I have ever grown and have been delicious, not sweet or sour.
So far the Rutgers is giving me the most trouble. It is producing good size tomatoes but the plant isn’t growing as well as the others. It is probably a quarter of the size of my other tomatoes, and I am not sure why. I have tied up some branches to help with the airflow, so we will see.
The winner of the season so far though has got to be the Sun Gold. I had never tried a Sun Gold before but my first taste may have put this as my number one so far this year. The taste is sweet like a fruit and the colors of tomatoes as they ripped are absolutely beautiful. The Sun Gold’s are so sweet that my one year old devours a bowl of them (of course cut up). The rich orange color and sweet taste- this will be a variety of tomatoes that I will definitely grow again.
I realize I also love Sun Golds because they are just beautiful. Watching the tomatoes change colors from green to the most beautiful orange has been amazing.
Sun Golds for the Win!
For a first time gardener I think Sun Golds is my number one recommendation. Sun Golds are easy to grow and produce tons and tons of tomatoes. For a time time gardener it is so much to grow a tomato plant that will produce bowls of beautiful tomatoes. I have not had any instances of cracking of my tomatoes- in fact I have yet to see a bad tomato on my Sun Golds. I use very large cages for this plant this year, but if you are starting out and have limited tools, a simple cage or even bamboo sticks could be used to support this plant, since the tomatoes are small. The tomatoes have a unique, sweet taste that you are sure to love.
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