The Big Tomato

…did you know?
The tomato is the world's most popular fruit. Just like the brinjal and the pumpkin, botanically speaking it is a fruit, not a vegetable. More than 60 million tons of tomatoes are produced per year, 16 million tons more than the second most popular fruit, the banana.

Tomatoes are rich in vitamins A and C and fiber, and are cholesterol free. An average size tomato (148 gram, or 5 oz) boasts only 35 calories. Furthermore, new medical research suggests that the consumption of lycopene - the stuff that makes tomatoes red - may prevent cancer. Lycopene is part of the family of pigments called carotenoids, which are natural compounds that create the colors of fruits and vegetables. As with essential amino acids, they are not produced by the human body. Lycopene is the most powerful antioxidant in the carotenoid family and, with vitamins C and E, protect us from the free radicals that degrade many parts of the body.

The scientific term for the common tomato is lycopersicon lycopersicum, which mean "wolf peach." It is a cousin of the eggplant, red pepper, ground cherry, potato, and the highly toxic belladonna, also known as the nightshade or solanaccae. There are more than 10,000 varieties of tomatoes.

In the beginning...
Tomatoes first grew as wild, cherry-size berries in the South American Andes, but the fruit, as we know it today, was developed in Mexico where it was known as 'tomatil' and traveled to Europe by boat with the returning conquistadors. Upon arrival in Italy, the heart-shaped tomato was considered an aphrodisiac, thus tomato in Italian, 'poma amoris', means "love apple."

Regarded as poison by American colonists because of its relation to deadly nightshade, the tomato's reputation was saved by Robert Gibbon Johnson, who stood on the New Jersey courthouse steps in 1820, and ate a tomato--with no adverse effects, to the amazement of the town. A ripened ovary of a seed plant, the tomato is by definition a fruit, but in 1893 the U.S. Supreme Court over-ruled Mother Nature declaring that tomatoes were not fruits, but vegetables.

The development of "tougher" tomatoes and the invention of the mechanical harvester saved processing tomato industry in the early 1960's, which had struggled with labor problems since WWII. Today, 100% of processed tomatoes are machine harvested.

The super ingredient....
The Joy of Cooking--your grandmother's favorite cookbook--lists 64 tomato recipes. These versatile fruits end up in everything from pasta and pizza to Bloody Marys and barbecue sauce and can be stuffed, boiled, stewed, pureed, deviled, glazed, pickled, grilled and fried. Ketchup, tomato sauce, pizza, tamales, cocktail sauce, tomato juice, meatloaf and barbecue sauces have many different flavors, but tomatoes are a main ingredient in these, as well as many other ethnic dishes.

If you suffer from skin disease, a tomato a day may keep the doctor away, as tomatine, tomato's principle alkaloid, concentrated in its branchy leaves and green fruit, heals certain fungous diseases of the skin. Each man, woman and child in America consumes almost 80 pounds of tomatoes every year.

Big, versatile and delicious...
While sunny California is far and away the world's largest producer of processed tomatoes, accounting for nearly half of the world's total production, the "love apple" is also an international hit, being grown in such diverse nations as Italy, Argentina, Algeria, Taiwan, Australia and Chile. Florida may have Disney World, Fort Lauderdale and the largest fresh tomato industry, but California is clearly number one nationally in processed tomato production, growing nine out of every 10 tomatoes processed in the U.S., with a crop value exceeding $547 million. California's tomato season is in it's peak from July through September when harvesters run 24 hours a day. The season, however, actually runs a full six months, beginning in June and running all the way through November.

With California's processed tomato tonnage skyrocketing from 3.3 million tons in 1970 to 10.75 million tons in 1994, California tomato acreage has more than doubled from 141,300 acres in 1970 to 311,000 in 1994.

Moist, dry, salty or sandy, the tomato can be grown in a surprising range of climates and in almost any soil. In California, tomatoes seem to grow EVERYWHERE--from the far northern portions of the state in Butte County clear to the Mexican border.

The largest tomato on record is a 7-pound monster grown in Oklahoma.