Black, Purple, and Brown Generally, the darker the tomato, the more acidic its flavor.Cherokee Purple is winey and sweet. Tomato guru Craig LeHoullier, who grows 100 varieties annually in Raleigh, NC, says it’s the perfect tomato because of its lush, intense, well-balanced flavor and natural disease resistance. It produces early, heavy harvests, and its flesh is a dusky, luscious purple with green marbling.Black Sea Man ripens earlier and tastes almost as good as Cherokee Purple.Black Prince bears heavy clusters of greenish-brown, tennis-ball-size tomatoes that are chock-full of juice. But it is susceptible to cracking in rainy weather. (But, hey, aren’t all of us?) MORE: 6 Foods Where Organic Matters Most White White tomatoes are no less acidic than their darker cousins, but their sweetness masks it.White Wonder has a mild flavor that is an ideal counterpoint to the big tomato flavor of the darker varieties in a salad.White Queen is a richer-tasting type. MORE: Secrets To Growing Plump Tomatoes Yellow and Orange The best varieties remind you that tomatoes are technically fruits.Hugh’s has translucent yellow flesh, with aromatic, peachy-sweet juice. Brace yourself for heavy harvests of squash-size tomatoes.Yellow Brandywine has a nectarine-like consistency with intense sweetness. The Platfoot strain (this refers to its seed-saving lineage) scores the highest marks for productivity and flavor in most gardens. Yellow Brandywine is late to ripen and does not set fruit well unless planted after the weather has taken a decidedly summery turn.Orange Strawberry is a rich, meaty, oxheart type that thrives in a moderate summer climate.Lillian’s Yellow Heirloom is a pale-yellow, potato-leaved variety with great yield, flavor, and disease tolerance.Taxi picks you up with lots of early, small tomatoes, and then the vines die off as the main-season varieties come on. How convenient!Mountain Gold is large and late and has few disease problems.Lemon Boy is a sunny yellow hybrid that’s another good producer.Verna Orange looks like a mango and is meaty and productive. MORE: 14 Non-Toxic Ways To Keep Pests Out Pink or Red Acidic, rich, sweet, complex, awesome—all these descriptions fall abysmally short when it comes to conveying the experience of sinking your teeth for the first time each summer into a sun-warmed, garden-fresh pink or red tomato at peak flavor.Brandywine tops everyone’s list in the classic tomato category. Its potato-leaved vines reach 10 feet with plump, pink fruit.German Johnson and Pruden’s Purple ripen a week earlier than Brandywine, but Pruden’s is more susceptible to disease.Anna Russian is a vigorous, flavorful, pink oxheart type.Eva Purple Ball is a reliable producer of attractive baseball-size fruit in all kinds of weather and is a smart choice if disease tolerance is your priority.Radiator Charlie’s Mortgage Lifter, Marizol Purple, German Red, and Strawberry, as well as Vintage Wine, an early, pink, potato-leaved variety with distinctive gold streaks, are all beloved for their exceptional flavor.Rutgers’ roots go back further than many heirlooms’.Better Boy, Big Beef, Celebrity, Carmello, and Mountain Fresh are widely available hybrids that produce loads of large, uniform, flavorful fruit. Better Boy has remarkable disease tolerance and keeps producing until frost. MORE: Easy + Delicious Oven-Dried Tomatoes Green These make a stimulating addition to a multicolored salad, both visually and gastronomically.Green Zebra has a rich, sweet taste balanced by a salty tang.Aunt Ruby’s German Green has a classic, rich tomato flavor, although its tendency to ripen without blushing yellow or amber like the other greens will have you constantly hand-checking it for softness.Green Giant is creating a lot of buzz in tomato circles these days. This little-known, potato-leaved type is soon to hit the big leagues. Prolific, vigorous, healthy, and great tasting. MORE: America’s Best Homemade Tomato Sauce BicolorThese have mild and sweet yellow flesh shot through with veins of red. They’re a visually stunning subset of the yellow/orange category and a must-have for any tomato salad.Georgia Streak, Striped German, Pineapple, and Peppermint are all great varieties. Where to Get Themrareseeds.comburpee.comseedsavers.orgterritorialseed.comtomatogrowers.com MORE: Tomato, Potato Sprays Linked To Parkinson’s Disease Most Fun to Grow (and Throw)1. Green Zebra2. Jolly3. Peach4. Banana Legs5. Black Plum6. Taxi7. Vintage Wine8. Eva Purple Ball The article “The Best Varieties for Tomato Lovers” originally ran on RodalesOrganicLife.com.
