I'm still waiting on my Branywines but the Striped German tomatoes have
just reached maturity. I was reading "The Politics of Food" by Marion
Nestle, when my wife put the evening salad on the table. I finished a
couple of more sentences when the purfume of tomatoes wafted into my
consciousness. The tomatoes weren't overwhelming in flavor. No full body
orgasm as you might expect fom heroin but subtly, persuasivly tomato-y
(not to put too fine a point on it). I was pleased with my season's work.

I suspect that like wine tasting, the emotional component can influence
taste. Sometimes your taste buds are best in the morning, or when you
are very hungry, or when you are relaxed and having a good time.

And no I wasn't being a male sexist pig being waited on by my wife. We
were having left-overs from the previous couple of days, "giant
zucchini" lasagna, garden pesto, and smoked chicken breast salad that I
had cooked. My "liebchen" took the opportunity to promenade the garden
for the tomatoes for the tomato salad* and the pleasure of it.

- Bill

* red onion + mozzarella + basil + vinagrette

In article . com,
wrote:

wrote:
Penelope Periwinkle wrote:
On 24 Aug 2006 14:57:43 -0700, wrote:

Why are our Brandywines taking so long? Why is there such a fruit size
difference between Stupice and Brandywines?

They're different varieties, that's why. Brandywines have been
selected to produce fewer but larger tomatoes, and it takes longer

We will harvest our first Brandywine tomorrow and tell you our opinion.

Our first pink Brandywine was 4 1/2" diameter. It had a lot of fissures
near the stem end but else was intact and had no blemished areas. After
trimming away the fissures and cutting out the extended stem-like-green
inside the tomato, we tasted it and it tasted just like all other
tomatoes. Other than the size, it wasn't much different than other
vine-ripened tomatoes or the Stupice. Is this the typical experience of
other Hierloom growers?

Lucky for us there are many other Brandywines, still green, on the two
6 ft vines.

Our largest Stupice still is about 1 1/2", now into our third partial
harvest. Any way to encourage growth to 2 1/2", the advertised size?
Regards, Phil