Kitchen Garden Forum

Hi, following on from the topic of supermarket tomatoes, I have question which hopefully one of you knowledgeable folk will be able to answer. Regarding Tomatoes on the vine; they always seem to be at the same stage of ripeness and of uniform size. How does this happen? The tomatoes I grow, each truss always has toms at differing stages of development, as well as ripeness. I'm assuming the Vine toms are a specific variety, developed to produce the fruits this way? Thanks in advance! Cheers.

Dear Elaine, i think you are assuming right.

You're right, Elaine. They are specially bred. Me, I wouldn't want my tomatoes to ripen all at the same time. It would take the pleasure out of going down to the greenhouse daily and plucking the day's toms, with all that leafy aroma and everything (and green hands).

I believe commercial growers pick them just as they begin to colour and then blast them with ethylene gas to turn them red. They aren't actually ripened on the plant as they would like us to think.

PLUMPUDDING wrote:I believe commercial growers pick them just as they begin to colour and then blast them with ethylene gas to turn them red. They aren't actually ripened on the plant as they would like us to think.

Commercial tomatoes are picked as soon as they are changing colour to ensure that the fruits are fully mature. By the time they reach the shops, three or four days later, they are fully ripe, For sure, though, they're packed tight so that the ethylene they give off naturally as they ripen is contained, to hasten their progress.

A grower cannot claim that their fruits are vine-ripened unless they actually are vine-ripened. That would be unlawful.

"FelixLeiterCommercial tomatoes are picked as soon as they are changing colour to ensure that the fruits are fully mature. By the time they reach the shops, three or four days later, they are fully ripe, For sure, though, they're packed tight so that the ethylene they give off naturally as they ripen is contained, to hasten their progress.

A grower cannot claim that their fruits are vine-ripened unless they actually are vine-ripened. That would be unlawful.

Felix

I'm sure you're right, though what you say would suggest that the tomatoes are not "vine ripened" - fair play, it sounds a lot better than "ripened in the packaging tomatoes"

As for correct descriptions by supermarkets, how about the common "Ripe and ready to eat"? When applied to melons, peaches, apricots, mangoes, etc it can usually be translated as "Rock hard, tasteless and not worth eating unless you're a hungry warthog".

Felix, you are so right about these fruits. I have given up buying nectarines and peaches as they are as you described, don't ripen and turn to an inedible mush. eeeeew! Cheers.

Thanks for the info and thoughts regarding Vine ripened tomatoes. I admit to being rather sceptical when I see this in shops.

I've often wondered how vine ripened tomatoes are all uniformly ripe because this never happens in real life and I rather like the the daily browse amongst my plants to pick whatever has ripened. However I would be delighted if my blackcurrant and redcurrant bunches would ripen uniformly. They're fiddly to pick if you only pick the ripest ones at the top of the bunch and I often find I have to wait until the bottom ones are ripe, by which time those at the top are either over-ripe or fall to the ground when you pick.