[Zen00]

Quote:

Originally Posted by John Timmer
Thanks to decades of breeding, the modern agricultural tomato has a lot of properties that are great for farmers: the plants are incredibly productive, and the resulting tomatoes hold up well to shipping. Just one small problem: they are nearly tasteless. Heirloom tomato strains have become available precisely because people aren't especially interested in the mass-produced, modern tomato.

In the words of a panel at the meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of science, we "broke" the tomato by allowing the plant breeders to respond to the needs of farmers, instead of the tomato's end-users: consumers. As a result, their breeding has produced a product that most people don't actually enjoy eating. And that's a public health issue, given that tomato-rich diets have been associated with a variety of beneficial effects.

Fortunately, the panel featured a number of people who are trying to fix the tomato using up-to-date biochemistry and genetics.

We broke the tomato, and we're using science to fix it

Long story short, we genetically bred the tomato to be robust, but at the same time bred out the flavor, now they're trying to get the flavor back without losing the other desirable traits.

 

[b3machi7ke]

Imagine that, humans trying to fix something that we broke. Never heard that before

 

[Pyro1298]

Now, if we can only do that for pizza...

 

[redfroth]

SCIENCE!!!

 

[Aparition]

This is so true.

My garden tomatoes are super juicy with a rich red color. They taste AMAZING.
Store bought tomatoes just taste like... I mean you can tell they are tomatoes but then they aren't.

 

[b3machi7ke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by redfroth

SCIENCE!!!

...is what screwed it up in the first place

 

[Rookie1337]

Quote:

Originally Posted by b3machi7ke

Imagine that, humans trying to fix something that we broke. Never heard that before

Imagine that the consumer complaining that the producer met one of their big demands (quantity and low price) and then complaining about it later.

Good god y'all. I suppose the poor and hungry really care about the taste of a tomato over just being able to eat one. How selfish.

Economics: Quantity or Quality; pick one but not both.

 

[Aparition]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rookie1337

Imagine that the consumer complaining that the producer met one of their big demands (quantity and low price) and then complaining about it later.

Good god y'all. I suppose the poor and hungry really care about the taste of a tomato over just being able to eat one. How selfish.

Economics: Quantity or Quality; pick one but not both.

Tomato seeds cost anywhere from FREE to $3.00. They are fairly easy to keep during the growing season and produce non-stop. They also taste x1000 better than the mass produced Mexico shipped product that fills most stores all year round.

The store tomato is often more expensive than growing one yourself.
If you hate gardening you can get something like a Topsy Turvy and grow your own tomatoes All Year Long in your kitchen.
https://www.topsyturvy.com/?MID=815388&gclid=CObV9YL7wrUCFcme4AodtyYA7Q

More like consumers being lazy accepting bland food in our stores, and just now realizing that cheaper produce tastes better.

 

[b3machi7ke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rookie1337

Imagine that the consumer complaining that the producer met one of their big demands (quantity and low price) and then complaining about it later.

Good god y'all. I suppose the poor and hungry really care about the taste of a tomato over just being able to eat one. How selfish.

Economics: Quantity or Quality; pick one but not both.

I dunno, my family's been growing their own food for as long as I can remember (30+ years). We've always had enough vegetables for ourselves, 3-4 other families, with some leftover for the local food bank. Not sure I agree that quantity vs quality is an either/or, seems like the process is inefficient. But what do I know, just been growing my own vegetables for the last couple decades, I'm sure you're more of an expert on it than I am

 

[Domino]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pyro1298

Now, if we can only do that for pizza...

No. Pizza is fine where it is. The problem is, is that, traditional pizza was bad.

 

[Vagrant Storm]

Yeah, even back when I lived in an apartment I had a bunch of 5 gallon buckets full of dirt growing tomatoes hanging on my balcony. I was doing that topsy-turvy thing long before any one made an info commercial for one...it was a fairly common place thing to do and some one went and made money off the idea.

That said...I think the store bought tomatoes still taste OK. I mean, you don't usually just grab a tomato and eat it. People typically mix it with something. Really I think in my cooking tomatoes are used more for their texture than their taste. If I was concerned with getting the taste in there I'd just put a couple cans of Tomato Paste in there.

 

[DayoftheGreek]

Reading things like this has inspired me to grow heirloom tomatoes this year in my garden.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heirloom_tomato

Supermarket tomatos are bland, regular garden tomatos are good, but these things are supposed to be even better!

 

[Aparition]

The "Mystery Heirloom Tomato" sounds interesting!
I don't understand the shelf life rating though. You don't grow your own tomatoes to put them on your shelves, you grow them to eat them.
Any stored tomatoes are canned or made into sauces. Those are few and far between in my house hold

 

[Huzzbutt]

As an avid gardener and builder of greenhouses (free windows + couple of hundred $ = greenhouse) I'd like to give a simple tip:
Don't over water, keep the plants of any sugar heavy plant like tomatoes and strawberries barely hydrated. Buying expensive heirloom or custom cultivars (custom exist in gardening too) is a great idea but if you go heavy on the water you might as well have bought the greens at a supermarket.

edit: changed a word.

 

[DayoftheGreek]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Huzzbutt

As an avid gardener and builder of greenhouses (free glasses + couple of hundred $ = greenhouse) I'd like to give a simple tip:
Don't over water, keep the plants of any sugar heavy plant like tomatoes and strawberries barely hydrated. Buying expensive heirloom or custom cultivars (custom exist in gardening too) is a great idea but if you go heavy on the water you might as well have bought the greens at a supermarket.

Thanks for the tip! I'll keep that in mind if I do end up planting some fancy tomatos this year.

Come to think of it, it's just about time to start planting indoors. ~8 weeks before last frost here. I've gotta get my seeds.

 

[Bit_reaper]

Quote:

Originally Posted by b3machi7ke

...is what screwed it up in the first place

While science can be applied to breading it has been done without the scientific method for millennia. Most people who do breading are not scientists.

Over breading is hardly a new thing. The best example is probably dogs as pure breed dogs are by average less healthy than mutts.

I also remember that there was an problem with modern pigs as they have been breed to produce more meat and less fat. The pork from low fat breed pigs is not as tasty as meat from older fatty types of pigs so some farmers/breeders have actually made a effort go back to a more fatty type pig breed.

 

[BugBash]

Keeping them in the fridge also kills off what ever flavour they may have had, I guess alot of store bought tomms were transported/stored at too low a temp.

 

[noak]

The title sounds like a cave johnson quote from portal

 

[airbozo]

Good timing. Just this weekend I turned all of my beds.

I use mostly heirloom seeds mainly because they were propagated to grow in my specific area and not only do they taste great, they grow wonderfully as well.

BTW: the barely hydrated tip is how I was taught as well and it works.

Some plants love to be abused, which is what forces them to put out so many flowers. I used to baby my plum trees and was very careful about pruning and feeding. A friend showed me how to double the crop, and it basically consists of not doing anything to it. My yield is now at least doubled.

Now I need to figure out how to get rid of all the Tomatillo plants that grow like weeds...

BTW: Science is also responsible for the mess that is the current egg as well. OK, part of it is the fact that the consumer was more attracted to the white spot free egg shells. Taste a farm fresh egg and you will never go back.

 

[Solarin]

I wouldn't say "science broke" anything. Food producers responded to the, then present, demand for more tomatoes at a lower price per unit. Now the demand is shifting away from that past demand and moving towards providing consumers with a greater variety of tomatoes with a more complex flavor profile. We apply science and human intelligence through genetics to achieve the traits we deem desirable in our agricultural food supply.

Was this a shock to anyone?
Quote:

BTW: Science is also responsible for the mess that is the current egg as well. OK, part of it is the fact that the consumer was more attracted to the white spot free egg shells. Taste a farm fresh egg and you will never go back.

I worked as a poultry nutritionist before now pursuing my doctorate, and I can say with certainty that any difference in taste you perceive is psychosomatic. Millions of dollars of research is done every year by the Agricultural industry to make a better tasting, branded egg. Eggland's has gotten close in terms of branding, but numerous taste tests (conducted by me in a laboratory setting) have yielded no conclusive evidence that there is a real significant difference in flavor between poultry eggs. This, of course, includes "farm fresh" eggs.