May 31, 2014 - Polverini Tomatoes

Last year one of my favorite neighbors invited me over to check out his garden. He had a really nice set up with all sorts of peppers and tomatoes.  One tomato he grew in particular caught my attention: a really tall indeterminate plant with meaty, plum-sized, balloon-shaped fruit - where they are fatter at the bottom and taper to the stem.  Near the stem they become wrinkled. Delicious too.

After talking a while, he tells me that the original plant was given to him by a family member who brought it over from Italy. For 40 years he has been saving the seeds and regrowing them right there in his back yard - the very definition of a local heirloom.

This tomato variety is what inspired me to start my tomatoes from seeds this year.  He gave me a handful of these tomatoes with instructions on how he saves the seeds.  He told me to scoop out the guts with the seeds and spread them along a paper plate. Then when they have completely dried out, scrape them into an envelope. So that is what I did.

This past winter was particularly cold and his sun room where he starts his tomatoes did not stay warm enough during the germinating process.  Most of his starts are short and leggy, I'm not sure his stock is going to make it.  

Fortunately this variety will live on.  I was able to raise 30 of his seeds and give them out to friends and family.I only wish I knew of his predicament before giving them all away.  The three plants I kept are the best growing plants in the garden.  I'll post more pictures of the fruit as they start to come in.

UPDATED July 7, 2014:

Here's some pictures of the fruits as they are coming in.  There is one red tomato on each of the plants that are a day or two away from picking.  The plants themselves are between 5' - 6' tall. After talking to a farmer at the market on Saturday, he suggested that they may be some variety of Ox Heart tomato. After doing a quick a Google Image search I think he might be right.

This was the shape that most of the Polverini Tomatoes were last year...

 ...and this was a typical sized tomato - about palm size.

Some of the fruit on my plants have gotten much larger and wider - the tomatoes I was given last year were more uniform in shape.

 This is the first one to ripen.

UPDATE: Here are a few from later in the season, including a good shot of a sliced one.