My Cherry Tomato Rainbow!

The cherry tomatoes are all producing well now. I always used to grow only red cherry tomatoes. Last year I added orange and really liked them, so this year I decided to add many more colors and grow a Cherry Tomato Rainbow!

Okay, okay, I realize that the colors don't exactly match the Crayola versions. My yellow tomatoes are more of a pale orange, my black tomatoes are more of a dark purple and my white tomatoes are more of a pale yellow, but aren't they pretty cool anyway?

Going left to right up the rainbow we have Sun Sugar as our orange variety, Gardener's Delight (my favorite red cherry), and Aunt Ruby's German Cherry as our green variety. I highly recommend all three of these tomato varieties. Sun Sugar and Gardener's Delight used to be the only two that I grew.

Sun Sugar is probably the sweetest tomato there is. My kids like to eat them when they are still yellow before they ripen all the way. At that stage, they are really sour like those war-head sour candies. Last year my youngest daughter aptly named them the Sweet-Tart Tomatoes. You get really sour or really sweet - your choice.

Last year I added Aunt Ruby's German Green tomatoes to my list of favorite odd heirloom tomatoes. The bigger Aunt Ruby's Green is a late tomato, but these Aunt Ruby's German Cherries mature early and taste and look just like their bigger cousins. Yum!

Next we have Egg Yolk tomatoes. My daughter picked these from the Baker Creek catalog just for the novelty. In Baker Creek's pictures, they look exactly like egg yolks. My Egg Yolks just look like yellowish cherry tomatoes. They do have pretty good flavor though.

The next one is one of my new favorites, Black Cherry. They are just like miniature Black Krim tomatoes!

Lastly, as our white tomato we have Italian Ice - the only hybrid in the rainbow. I have Kimberly from Life of a Garden blog to thank for these. She saw that I was growing White Tomesol and Great White heirloom tomatoes and thought I would like to try a white cherry tomato, so she sent me some seeds. It does add to the rainbow nicely. Its flavor is, well, different. It almost doesn't taste like a tomato. I'll hold my judgement until I get to eat a few more. I'm also excited to try those White Tomesols.

I am growing two each of last year's favorites, Gardener's Delight and Sun Sugar. For the other colors, I only have one plant each. Eight cherry tomato plants will produce an almost infinite amount of cherry tomatoes! They are growing nicely on my tomato trellis.

With all of this good tomato eatin', life is just a bowl of cherries!

Comments

[August 12, 2008 at 01:25 AM]

Nice tomatoes. I didn't know some of those varieties came in cherry tomatoes.

I too am growing Aunt Ruby's German Greens. How do you know when they are ripe? I am totally befuddled. ~ksp

[August 12, 2008 at 01:34 AM]

I will be trying some of the varieties you have suggested. thanks for the tips

[August 12, 2008 at 03:30 AM]

I am so jealous. I had a similar set of plants but delayed planting and a massive thunderstorm killed most of my plants.

[August 12, 2008 at 02:15 PM]

I'll have to try the sun sugar next year. For some reason my daughter doesn't like tomatoes. We will have to run a DNA test on her to confirm her lineage..

[August 12, 2008 at 07:44 PM]

Where did you get the black cherry tomato seeds? They look very cool, as do all the colors of your rainbow!

[Laura]

I'm growing a range of cherry toms too this year and the white one 'White Rabbit' is turning out to be a bit of a star. Very unlike a tomato in taste but really delicious and prolific. I've saved seeds if you want to try it for next year.

[September 05, 2008 at 10:00 PM]

Oooh... now I'm kicking myself! I bought a package of 'Black Cherry' seeds this spring, but never got around to planting them. Had I known that they tasted like miniature 'Black Krim' tomatoes, I would have definitely MADE time. Yum.

Love the rainbow!

[Gardening Seeds]

Hey nice tomatoes !!! I'm so jealous ... i love them...

[rigo grajeda]

does anybody have seeds of banana shaped or pepper shaped tomatoes?
email me please
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