Slicer Sized Long Keeping Varieties

[greenthumbomaha]

I have orange slicers ripen and stay firm with no molding or mushy spots all the way to Thanksgiving this year. Flavor was good, but not as good as August fresh pickings. The reds turned mushy in spots or molded stored under the same cnditions.


Have you noticed any standouts in the storage arena?


- Lisa

[Nan_PA_6b]

I've grown some of the "pendjar", "colgar," or "hanging" storage tomatoes. Standout was Ramallet Ibiza Blanca, which kept for months and still had good taste. My mother has Big Beefs picked green before first frost still ripening in a cool room in her house.

[greenthumbomaha]

The facebook photos were boxes of tennis ball sized or regular roma sized perfectly red tomatoes. Likely not multiflora type.

I tried to ripen Sungold by cutting the vine and hanging in my chilly garage. The flavor wasn't there.
Sungold picked green or slight color ripened in a bowl in the kitchen ripened and were tolerable with salad dressing but fruit flies got to them after a few days.

I don't think I have the patience for multiflora maintenance in the field. I have tried.
Sweet 100 is my limit, and when the harvest starts in a frenzy, cherries sometimes don't get picked in time. The neighbor gives up after a bowl full too.

- Lisa

Black Beauty was a standout for post-ripening storage qualities in 2017. It seemed to be a cold weather tomato, too. Definitely a slicer. My fruits were pretty big (maybe between 10 to 16oz).

I tried regrowing it this year, but I got what appeared to be some crosses.

[Labradors2]

Not a slicer or a long keeper, but I just finished some delicious Maglia Rosa tomatoes a couple of days ago. I didn't really store them, but my secret was that I grew the plant in a 3 gallon pot which was easy to move around.

Seeds were started in mid-Feb, and kept on a window sill until flower buds formed, then it was potted up and put outside. I began to harvest ripe tomatoes in mid-June. The plant produced all summer long and, when the frosts came, I brought the plant inside in the unheated sunroom, putting it outside whenever the temps were around 50F. When the temperature got really cold, I harvested all the tomatoes and allowed them to ripen.

Linda

[greenthumbomaha]

At quick glance I read your Magla Rosa as keeping a few years, Linda. I think I will do the pot shuffle too. I too start in Feb and use 3 gal bakery buckets for growing the early tomatoes and moving them to the garage until frost is passed. Maybe an encore for Magla Rosa this spring. So good when they don't split.


- Lisa

[Labradors2]

Do give it a whirl this spring Lisa, I'm sure you won't be disappointed. Maglia Rosa doesn't split for me. Perhaps keeping it close to the door means that I always keep it well picked, although I have noticed that they keep well without splitting when I store them inside.

Linda

[Nan_PA_6b]

I'll attest to the good taste of Maglia Rosa.

[habitat_gardener]

Large cherry size:
I still have some Rosa di Benevento tomatoes that I picked over a month ago. Many of them didn’t last because they had leaf-footed bug damage, but the ones that escaped damage seem to have a very long shelf life. They are a matte pink color on the outside but more deeply colored inside. At the height of the season, the flavor did not stand out and I canned most of them. I got the seed from Portland Seedhouse.