What are the best tomatoes to grow? That depends a lot on you. There are so many choices. Twenty five years ago there may have been a dozen choices. Now there are entire catalogues dedicated to seeds and plants.

You can grow red, yellow, orange, green, black and even white tomatoes, as well as tomatoes with stripes. There are tomatoes that ripen early in summer and tomatoes that don't mature until the hot and humid days of August. Cherry tomatoes are so small and sweet you can pop them in your mouth. Plum tomatoes make great sauce because they have thick flesh and almost no seeds. Heirloom tomatoes from Pennsylvania, Germany, Russia, France and Italy are flavorful old-fashioned varieties that you rarely see for sale in the grocery store.

A lot of tomato fanciers will disagree with what I am about to say, but if the truth be told, any tomato can be used for any purpose. You can make sauce with any tomato. You can put any tomato on a salad or slice it for sandwiches. It dosn't really matter. Any tomato you have grown with your own hands will taste great no matter how you use it.

Rutgers, Marglobe and Celebrity are three well-known early season, red, round tomatoes long popular in the Northeast. They are great all purpose tomatoes. When you buy a "Jersey" tomato, chance are you are getting one of these. They are reliable producers of medium-sized fruit for New York's somewhat shorter season.

Many tomato fanciers prefer the larger "Beefsteak" type tomatoes such as Abraham Lincoln or Big Boy. These fruits can weigh in at a pound or more each and they ripen later in the summer. I have had good luck growing Marmande, a somewhat flat, rib-shouldered French tomato with good size and flavor.

Some of the best dwarf tomatoes, which are perfect for containers or small urban backyard gardens, include Florida Petite, Red Robin, Sweet Chelsea, Small Fry and Bush Early Girl, a two foot tall tomato plant that produces six to seven ounce fruits. Sweet 100 is considered by many to be the ultimate cherry tomato to grow.

Heirloom tomato varieties, passed down from nineteenth and early twentieth century gardens, usually have quirky stories that go along with their unusual shapes, sizes and colors. They are as much fun to talk about as they are to grow and eat.

You can grow radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifter from the back woods of West Virginia. Bred by a garage mechanic, these tomatoes were so good the man paid off his mortgage by selling the plants. You can plant Brandywine tomatoes from the Amish in Pennsylvania, Black Krim from the Black Sea in Russia, Costoluto Genovese from Italy and dozens more.

Totally Tomatoes. Laurence Sombke. Daily News. February, 2000

There is nothing quite like the taste of a home grown tomato. Farmer's market tomatoes aren't too bad, but there is a certain satisfaction that comes with nurturing the tiny plants as they grow, flower and set fruit. And then comes that glorious day when you pluck that first ripe tomato from the vine and devour it with gusto and maybe a little salt.

Tomatoes are everybody's favorite vegetable to grow. And they are definitely American. Growing first in South America and Mexico tomatoes were brought back to Europe by the Conquistadores and were soon gown widely in Spain and Italy. Thomas Jefferson was one of the first Americans to grow tomatoes and there were widely popular beginning in the early part of the 19^th century.

Tomatoes are actually fairly easy to grow but they do have their requirements. They must have abundant sun, at least six to eight hours of golden sunshine each day. They like warm temperatures. Don't plant them outside until all danger of frost has passed. They thrive in soil that is crumbly and full of organic compost.

The Best Tomatoes to Grow

What are the best tomatoes to grow? That depends a lot on you. There are so many choices. Twenty five years ago there may have been a dozen choices. Now there are entire catalogues dedicated to tomato seeds and plants.

There are early season and late season tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, tomatoes for canning, and tomatoes for making paste. You can grow yellow, orange, green or white tomatoes, as well as tomatoes with stripes. Heirloom tomatoes from Pennsylvania, Germany, Russia, France and Italy have created a whole new colorful avalanche of tomato choices.

For tomato growers there are really only two types of tomatoes: determinate and indeterminate. Determinate tomatoes are better for urban gardeners because they tend to be small and bushier than indeterminate plants which can grow as tall as five feet. Determinate plants grow to a certain size and stop, setting most of their fruit over a four to six week period. Indeterminate plants continue get larger and set fruit until they are killed by frost. There are more indeterminate varieties than determinate, but there are plenty of selections for both types.

Rutgers, Marglobe and Celebrity are three well-known tomato types long popular in the Northeast. They are medium-sized fruit and reliable producers for New York's somewhat shorter summer season.

Many tomato fanciers prefer the larger Abraham Lincoln, Big Boy or Beefsteak tomatoes for their rich tomato taste. I have had good luck with Marmande, a somewhat flat, ribbed-shouldered French tomato with good size and fine flavor.

Some of the best small or dwarf tomatoes, which are perfect for containers or small urban gardens, include Florida Petite, Red Robin, Sweet Chelsea, Small Fry and more. Sweet 100 is considered by many to be the ultimate cherry tomato.

Heirlooms have put a lot of fun back into tomato growing. Now you can grow Radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifter from the woods of West Virginia, Brandywine from the Amish of Pennsylvania, Black Krim from the Black Sea in Russia, Costoluto Genovese from Italy and dozens more.

Choosing varieties for resistance to the tomato's ugly diseases of Fusarium wilt and Verticillium wilt will save you a lot of headaches and heartache. These common diseases make the plants turn yellow and blotchy just when they are ready to produce. In the catalogues, look for the letters "V" and "F" after the name of the variety you like. If you see V or F it means your choice is resistant to these diseases. Grow what you want but get the disease resistant varieties when you have a choice.

Seed Starting or Buying Transplants

There are two ways to get tomato plants ready for transplanting to your garden. The easiest way is to buy seedlings that have been sprouted by somebody else. You can order these from a few selected catalogues or buy them at garden centers or farmer's markets. Seedlings used to be limited in variety, but growers are producing more and more selections each year.

The more time consuming method is to sprout the seeds yourself in containers indoors. Naturally you can choose from a much wider variety of tomato seeds doing it this way and you get the satisfaction of watching them sprout and grow in eager anticipation. Start your tomato seeds six to eight weeks before you plan to plant them in the garden, a few days after the last spring frost. Here's how:

First, fill as many peat pots or new plastic or clay pots with soilless potting mix. Moisten the mix with water. Plant two seeds in each pot, about 1/4 inch part and 1/4 inch deep. Cover with mix and lightly tamp down. Place the pots in a warm spot, 75 to 80 degrees, and keep them just moist until the seeds germinate in about one to two weeks.

When the seedlings germinate, move the pots to a sunny spot with a temperature of 60 to 70 degrees. Once the seedlings produce their first true pair of leaves, prune out one of the seedlings leaving the best one in each pot.

Ten days before you plan to plant them outdoors, begin to acclimatize them to the outdoors (a process called "hardening off",) by exposing them to the outdoors for several hours per day. Don't leave them out overnight until the very last couple days and then only if you are sure there is no frost in the forecast.

Getting the Garden Ready to Plant

Tomato plants have huge roots systems and they thrive in a deeply-dug, organically-rich soil that is not too heavily fertilized. Too much fertilizer creates lots of foliage but fewer tomatoes.

First, pick out a good spot that gets full sun, at least eight hours of sun each day. Next, find a spot that is not soggy: tomatoes like soil that is evenly moist but not waterlogged.

Tomatoes need room. Plan to space them about three feet apart. A rectangular grid pattern works great. Six tomato plants provides easily enough for a family of four to eat all the fresh tomatoes they want with some to spare for the neighbors next door.

Dig the soil to a depth of eight inches and break up the soil really well. Add two to three shovels full of compost for each tomato plant and dig that in to the soil. Rake everything smooth and you are ready to plant.

Plant the tomatoes outdoors after all danger of frost has passed, about between May 1^st and May 15^th in the New York City area. Nighttime frost will kill your plants, so, resist the temptation to plant too early. Tomatoes won't grow well until warm weather arrives anyway, so you are just wasting your time by planting them too early.

Dig a hole twice the size of the tomato plant root ball and toss in one cup of granular organic fertilizer. Dig that into the hole. Gently coax the transplant out of the pack, place the root ball in the bottom of the hole and refill the hole, firmly patting the soil around the plant. Tomatoes can be planted about one to two inches deeper than they were in the transplant pack.

Water the tomatoes and spread a two to three inch thick layer of mulch such as shredded leaves, compost, shredded bark or straw to keep the weeds down, keep the soil cool and retain moisture.

Because tomato plants can grow as much as three feet tall, they need to be supported. I have used stakes and cages and both work equally as well. If you use stakes, gently tie the tomato vines to the stakes with something soft and flexible like old panty hose or string.

Tomatoes in Containers. Tomatoes can easily be grown in containers if you put the right tomato in the right sized container. Select the dwarf or determinate varieties of tomato. Cherry tomatoes are usually grown on smaller plants perfect for containers. But don't overlook a compact variety like Bush Early Girl which produces six to seven ounce tomatoes on a two-foot-tall plant.

A container for a tomato should be no smaller than 14 to 16 inches wide and equally as deep. Tomatoes have big root systems and you need a big enough pot to hold enough water. If you want to grow a really big tomato, you might consider using one of those half whisky barrels as your container. Make a soil mix of half potting soil and half compost. Mix in a cup or granular organic fertilizer and plant the same as you would for an outdoor site.

Container grown anything needs plenty of water. In full sun, you might need to water every day. Keep the plant moist but not soaked. Place a saucer under the container if possible to capture run off.

Pests and Other Problems. The diseases Fusarium and Verticillium are tomatoes two big problems. If you grow disease resistant varieties, you should be okay. If not, be prepared for yellowing plants. There is not much you can do about it.

Blossom end rot is another problem. This forms a little black smudge at the bottom of the plant during dry weather. Keep your plants evenly watered during dry spells and check your soil's pH if the problem persists. You may need to add lime to correct the pH.

Tomato hornworms are the larval stage of a moth. They are colorful, one-inch-long caterpillars who love to devour your plants. Pick them off by hand or apply Dipel or Thuricide, both bacteria-derived pesticides that are not known to be harmful to humans.

Tomato Catalogues and Resources

Almost any full service garden catalogue will sell you tomato seeds, and you can find some great varieties in packets at garden centers or botanical garden gift shops. But if you want the full tomato seed buying experience, check out these sources:

Totally Tomatoes, P.O. Box 1626, Augusta, GA 30903-1626, (803)663-0016 or www.totallytomato.com. Dedicated to the avid tomato grower, this colorful old-fashioned catalog fills 80 pages with varieties of tomato seeds, lore and supplies.

Tomato Growers Supply Company, P.O. Box 2237, Ft. Myers, FL 33902. (888) 478-7333 or www.tomatogrowers.com. More than 335 varieties of seeds for tomatoes. A very complete tomato catalogue.