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Brandywine

From Colleen Vanderlinden, About.com

The Brandywine is the most popular heirloom vegetable, and it's easy to see why: flavorful, beautiful, and juicy, the Brandywine may be the perfect tomato.

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Brandywine TomatoPhoto courtesy of Pricegrabber.
The Brandywine is the first heirloom tomato variety to officially earn a cult status. Its flavor is spectacular; full and rich, not too sweet or too acidic. It has a Brix rating of 6, making it a good option for fresh eating. This is a tomato you'll want to slice onto your favorite sandwich or add to a salad to give it some real flavor. Possibly the best way to eat a Brandywine is all by itself, so you can truly enjoy its flavor. The texture is wonderful, too: soft and juicy, and not mealy at all.

Brandywines produce nice-sized fruits, usually around one pound. The skin and flesh is a lovely tomato pink (there are red and yellow brandywines, but this is the classic Brandywine tomato, which is also known as Sudduth's Brandywine.) The plants are indeterminate, and will need a good support structure. Brandywines generally don't produce high yields, so it's a good idea not to depend on them as your sole source of tomatoes. But when they do produce, it becomes obvious that they are definitely worth growing.

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