Coeur d'Albenga Tomato

[jeffinsgf]

Carolyn,

I absolutely agree that we have no idea at all what we have, or how many different names it's being called by however many different vendors are selling it.

That's why I'm proposing that the Tomatoville community send me to Italy to sort it out. It should only take most of next summer. I don't need a large villa, either. A small one will do, as long as it has a nice garden area where I can be tutored by the locals in how to grow Italian tomatoes and a fully equipped restaurant kitchen where I can learn to use those tomatoes to their maximum capacity. I promise to come back with carefully sorted seed bins, with the locally agreed upon names, enough stories to keep the forum entertained for months, and enough recipes to consider publishing a cookbook.

I will be happy to send John some seed from the packet I got from BC. It will be most interesting to grow it side-by-side with what he gets from France. I wish I had the space to get some of all the variations and names to see just exactly what's what. I could be to pyriforms what CamoChef is to Brandywines.

[Lamb Abbey Orchards]

Carolyn:

I'll gladly send you seeds of them all in 2010. Thanks again.


John

[jeffinsgf]

And another entry into the fray.

http://www.gourmetseed.com/product/T...Abruzzese.html

I ordered a pack of these today. I was shopping for English cucumbers, which they also had. Flat rate shipping forced me into looking to see what else they had that I couldn't live without.

[Lamb Abbey Orchards]

Jeff:

Thanks for the link. My dad's side of the family is from Abruzzi, so I got a particular chuckle out of the link.

Here's one for you in return:

http://www.csivert.com/product_info....404ca7036ea467



I'm going to order a couple packs of these myself. They're about as close as I've seen commercially to the photos of the Coeur d'Albenga. I'm assuming they're probably the same, actually.

This is definitely a cultivar distinct from Piriform.

Enjoy!

John

[jeffinsgf]

John,

If you order from the company in France, please add another pack. I will gladly reimburse you for the seed and part of the postage.

[Lamb Abbey Orchards]

Jeff:

Will do. I'm not ordering these immediately, but I will before next Spring.


John

[jeffinsgf]

The packet from Gourmet seeds says, "minimum 300 seeds", so I'll be happy to forward some of the Abruzzese to you, if you're interested.

[carolyn137]

You know what it's starting to sound like to me? Like the same tomato is called by the name of a certain region in Italy such as Costoluto Fiorentino, Costoluto GEnovese, Costoluto Cantonese, etc.

The word costoluto meaning ribbed in Italian/

Same variety, different name depending on geographic location.

And the pictures being shown here and at Tania's site seem to be indicating the same thing,don't they.

[Lamb Abbey Orchards]

Carolyn:

Aside from Liguria/Albenga and Abruzzi, what other 'geographic locations' have you found associated with this tomato?

I was anticipating this tomato to be associated with many other towns/regions in both Italy and France, but I've only heard of two thus far.

Which others am I missing?


John

[jeffinsgf]

Abruzzo in the one I just found at Gourmet seeds, but other than that, they all seem to come from Liguria.

[Lamb Abbey Orchards]

Jeff:

I really appreciate the offer. You can actually hold off on the GRS seeds too for now.

For the time being, I think I'm going to just focus on any piriform-type tomatoes that reference Liguria and the town of Albenga within it. I think I'll have enough strains to play with amongst these to find a great piriform paste tomato for the garden.

I'm quite curious to see how these strains compare with Goldman's Italian American.

Thanks again,


John

[Lamb Abbey Orchards]

Jeff:

I thought this photo I just ran across on Flickr might be enough incentive for you to book that trip for yourself to Liguria:




Whaddaya think? Those Cuori di Bue tomatoes were about 62-cents/pound at the time the photo was posted.



John

[jeffinsgf]

You are a cruel, cruel man, John. lol

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by Lamb Abbey Orchards

Carolyn:

Aside from Liguria/Albenga and Abruzzi, what other 'geographic locations' have you found associated with this tomato?

I was anticipating this tomato to be associated with many other towns/regions in both Italy and France, but I've only heard of two thus far.

Which others am I missing?


John

John, I haven't been doing any serious Googling on this at all , it's for you and Jeff to do your thing, and I was referring to those from Italy only.

Any found in France would be from seeds from Italy. Seeds travel with folks from country to country as is well known.

But the large piriform shaped varieties certainly appear to have originated in Italy regarless of the current names they carry.

it's really no different than the pink or red heart shaped varieties that have different names in Spain, in Italy, in the US and other parts of Europe as well. Are some different from others? Sure, some are pink and some are red, but otherwise????? Maybe taste? Lots of examples in this regard.

Last year I grew Serdste Builova, a pink heart and the name translated from Russian. This year I thought I had a new one called Bawale Cerce, and it turns out it's the same variety translated from the Polish.

So if I were you I'd concentrate on just those varieties from Italy, b'c, as I said, the same varieties can travel and do.

Goldman's Italian American isn't a good one to look at, IMO bc its the result of a selection made from an original hybrid, probably an accidental X pollination, and was dehybridized to the OP state as Amy has said, and she compares it to Franchi's Red Pear as her Goldman one does in its dehybridized state. So you might want to get Franchi's Red Pear which you can do by going to Bill's site at Growing Italian.

[Lamb Abbey Orchards]

Carolyn:

Thanks again for the great info. I'll take your suggestion on the Franchi. I've set aside space for 4 different piriform types, in addition to the Goldman's Italian American (which is doing quite well in my garden this year).

So next Spring, as part of the tomato block, I'll be planting 2 dozen plants of these five piriform tomatoes:

• Franchi Red Pear
• Cuneo Giant Pear
• Liguria
• Coeur d'Albenga (from a source in France)
• Goldman's Italian America

I'll probably try additional similar cultivars (like the Abruzzese Red Pear) the following year, but these initial five should allow me to do a basic comparison of piriform-type paste tomatoes. I considered adding the Johnny's Piriform, but I just don't care much for the green-shouldered types.

These final five complete my list of tomatoes for 2010, of which I'll be growing 2 dozen plants of each:

1. Amana Orange
2. Aunt Gertie's Gold
3. Berkeley Tie Dye
4. Casey's Pure Yellow
   
5. Coeur d'Albenga (for paste)
6. Cuneo Giant Pear (for paste)
7. Cuostralee
8. Dachilo
   
9. Earl's Faux
10. Ed's Millennium
    
11. Ernie's Plump (for paste)
12. Franchi Red Pear (for paste)
13. Gallo Plum (for paste)
14. Goldman’s Italian American (for paste)
15. Gold Medal
16. Il San Marzano Lungo (for paste)
17. JD's Special C Tex
    
18. KBX
19. Liguria (for paste)
20. Limmony
21. Long Tom (for paste)
    
22. Lucky Cross
23. Mexico
24. Neves Azorean Red
25. Omar’s Lebanese
    
26. Paul Robeson
    
27. Pink Berkeley Tie Dye
28. Pink Brandywine, Sudduth Strain
29. Porkchop
30. Pruden's Purple
31. Ramapo F1 Hybrid
32. Slankard’s (for paste)
33. Solid Gold F1 Hybrid
34. Tennessee Britches
35. Wild Sweetie
36. Zogola

Now to get through the Late Blight scare of 2009 . . .



John