Yesterday, my wife came into the house with the mail. She was carrying the March 2010 issue of the magazine, Martha Stewart Living.
"There's an article in here about the best tasting tomatoes. Have a look," she said as she pushed the magazine into my hands.
The article described a tomato tasting party hosed by Martha Stewart and attended by five other knowledgeable individuals including Barbara Damrosh, vegetable grower and co-owner of the Four Seasons Farm in Maine, and Michael Anthony, Executive Chef at the Gramercy Tavern in New York City.
The group tasted 30 tomato varieties and rated 13 as the best.
The magazine article included some beautiful photos of the tomatoes but was short on details of the voting. For example, the full list of the 30 tomatoes sampled was not included, nor were the actual scores each tomato received.
The top 13 tomatoes were shown in a photo and included: Speckled Roman, Alberto Shatters, Big Rainbow, Reisetomate, Green Doctors, Black Cherry, Sapho, Green Zebra, Yellow Peach, Jaune Flamme, German's Italian American, Sara's Galapagos, and Casady's Folly.
What surprised me about the list, was the notable absence of the Brandywine, perhaps the most famous heirloom and the variety widely believed to be the best tasting tomato -- full stop.
I can think of only two explanations....
- Either the Brandywine is not what's it's cracked up to be, and didn't make the top 13.
- The Brandywine was not one of the 30 included in the tasting; a very odd omission that would be like rating the best auto companies in the world and not including BMW in the competition.
OK tomato lovers, what do you think? Is the Brandywine overrated?
What's your favorite tomato?
Feel free to post your comments on this blog.
In the mean time, I'll e-mail the Martha Stewart Living and see if I can find out more.
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Posted by: Miguel | 10/07/2010 at 04:45 AM