Ted's Pink Currant Tomato

I love these fruit! I direct seeded these outside in the spring, and they grew perfectly. We got the first ripe fruit about two weeks ago. They are so sweet, and practically explode in your mouth. Plus, they are so prolific! I only planted two plants, but in the last two days I got nearly a pint of tomatoes. I use them in salad or stir fries, or just eat them as a snack.

VSC NOTES: Thank you for the review, Amber. It is one of my favorite small fruited tomato varieties as well. I just want to point out to folks that although Amber had success direct sowing her tomato seeds, this is not the recommended practice. More often than not it will result in failure. In most locations, tomato seeds should be started indoors where conditions can be closely controlled and monitored. ~Mike

I ended up keeping two plants for myself and giving the extra starts to friends. After attempting to contain them, I gave in and let them go wild along a wire fence. Even after pruning aggressively they grew into a thicket nearly 5' tall... ABSOLUTELY COVERED IN DELICIOUS PINK 1/2" TOMATOES.

It's hard to impress upon you the quantity of tomatoes that I got from these. I only fertilized once with a side-dressing of crab meal when they were about two feet tall and eventually watering became impossible without a machete.

They flowered and produced fruit until almost the first frost but the flavor wasn't as sweet anymore.

Harvesting the fruit with their vines works well. Don't even bother trying to pick them off individually. The teeny seeds kinda messes with trying to make sauce with the extra tomatoes. Not sure what to do to preserve them ... I'm going to put them in a more 'out of the way' spot this year.

I highly recommend these little guys. They are very tasty, and not too acidic. I grew two of these plants and quickly got overwhelmed with tiny pink balls of goodness. These plants are wild, and take a lot of management to keep them from going too crazy. I felt like i might need to go at it with the machete a few times, but I resisted that urge. With my two plants I could easily pick a couple quarts every few days, and finally got to the point where I just couldn't pick em all. I took a lot of them to work. While I plan to try new tomatoes every year, these will get another go!

I grew these last year and saved the seed for future years. Very sweet and continued to grow until frost. The two plants produced an unbelievable quantity of fruit. So many that I had enough for salads, snacks and give to neighbors. The neighbors also had their fill! I had so many that I had enough to make sauce from them as well. The sauce was fabulous! Simply placed them in a blender and reduced the mix to sauce consistency.

As stated in other reviews, the plants grow out of control. I gave up trying to manage them and just let them go. I am guessing that at the end of the season the plants, if allowed to grow vertically, would be 8 to 9 feet tall. I grow all of my tomatoes in five gallon buckets elevated off the ground in a rack. Currently (21 Jun 2018) in the area where this cultivar was grown there are literally dozens (if not hundreds) of plants in the ground. I think this is the first time ever this has happened!

The only drawback to this cultivar is that if the fruit is allowed to ripen completely on the plant it is nearly impossible to pick them without squishing them. I'm guessing this is the reason for the tremendous number of volunteers on the ground this year. The remedy was to pick them when they first blushed and allow then to ripen in the house.

Overall, I would recommend this cultivar as a small fruited type.