For some reason I am having trouble postiing messages. So here goes
again. The old oxhearts sold from 1900 -up til the heirloom era are as
you describe. Hard green shoulders that never ripen, a peculiar balnd
taste. They did come in yellow red and pink. The pink was the most
popular and sold as the Giant Oxheart. The first tomato could be quite
large and the folks that grew them would take them to the stock markets
on Saturdays and brag about the size. Only the first couple of tomatoes
got size however. Today there have been a a large number of Oxhearts
introduced. The one that gets a lot of positive press is the German Red
Strawberry. I suspect that you got one of the new "heirlooms" at the
farmers market. A short list of some that are available:
http://www.tomatogrowers.com/Oxhearts.htm
wrote:
Grave Yard Guy wrote:
Five years ago, I purchased some oxheart tomatoes from an old farmer at a
local flea market. They were, unquestionably, the best tasting tomatoes I
have ever "experienced". They were VERY dark red, almost burgundy, in
color...very meaty with little juice and only a few seeds. I went back the
next week for more, but it was the end of the season and there were none
left.

The next spring, I decided to grow my own. However, it took contacting over
20 nurseries before I could find one that had oxhearts for sale. I
purchased and planted 3 dozen plants, nurtured and cared for them on my
hands and knees every morning, pinched suckers and watered and fertilized
properly.

By mid July, about 75 days later, I had magnificent plants about 6-7 feet
tall with 5 or 6 tomatoes on each plant. I figured the low yeild might be
the price I had to pay for these jewels. They ripened from the bottom up,
but by the time the tops were almost ripe, the bottoms began to get soft and
mushy, so I began to harvest a little sooner, however, the tops of these
weren't edible. Of the 36 plants, I probably had a dozen or more tomatoes
that weighed in at 2 pounds or more, the rest being a half pound or larger!
But the taste was nothing near what I had experienced the previous year and
the color never got any darker than medium pink.

All summer long I tried to locate the old guy who had sold me the originals.
I wanted to know what I was doing wrong. He was no where to be found, but
some other old timers told me that there were both Pink and Red oxhearts. I
had planted the wrong thing.

For the last 3 years, I have planted only what has been lableled Red
oxhearts, but each year I get the same results, large, pink, half ripened,
not so tasty tomatoes.

Can anyone with some "oxheart" experience point me in another direction? Is
there a Burgundy oxheart? I've found white and purple.