I don’t know the name or variety of these tomatoes but they sure are HUGE!!! (I’ve since been informed they are ‘Rosa’ tomatoes). This year I bought several baby tomato plants from Silves monthly market which is held on the 3rd Monday of each month.
This is an excellent market for vegetable plants, fruit bushes and trees.
In my best pidgeon Portuguese I asked the plant seller for ‘Muito grande, tomates’. The lady nodded with a grunt and a smile then presented me with six plants. My purchase based purely on trust and a leap of faith were planted in my recently manured vegetable area. Yes, I splashed the cash and with the encouragement of a dear friend went to the local stables to buy some horse manure.
The first tomato of the crop weighed in at 1 lb 8oz
Although the tomatoes were a little misshapen and would win no EU awards for the ‘perfect tomato’ they tasted absolutely delicious.
The taste and texture of the flesh reminded me of beefsteak tomatoes we used to buy in the UK. There were hardly any pips and they were far less watery than normal tomatoes.
I will certainly be saving the seeds for next year’s crop!
Piglet in Portugal 
you seem to keep enough colour in your images to enhance the subject matter..cool
LikeLike
Oh! My tomato craving husband will want to return to Portugal for more than the friendly people, history, and beauty now. These are ripe in July then? Maybe next year…..Portugal here we come!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes, they are ripe in July… maybe before. Perhaps you take some seeds back with you and grow them back in the UK 🙂
LikeLike
I was just going to say Tomato Rosa as well. I grew them for the first time last year. Not as big as yours :))) All that horse manure paid off!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ha…it certainly did! I’m just waiting for the next deleiver for my winter crop 🙂
LikeLike
wow they are massive . . .they must make an amazing sauce or have you been using them differently?
LikeLike
Becky, this is the first time I’ve grown this variety so I am still experimenting. Chutney, sauce.. salad. Looking forward to trying them all. 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Gigantic! Nothing like the taste of home grown tomatoes. Have a wonderful weekend.
LikeLike
Thanks, Sami. And you 🙂
LikeLike
They are whoppers…..less watery and tasty too! I[m very impressed. It makes sense to keep the seeds for next year’s crop.
LikeLike
I am hoping they will make good chutney 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
These DO look fabulous! Am glad you cut one into half as many of the large ones can be watery and full of seeds – this is all ‘meat’! And what does shape matter? Following TdF at the moment a few days back I was presented with a photo of a row of Limousin cows in Normandy making short work of eating bushels and bushels of carrots not acceptable to European supermarkets because they did not look ‘pretty’ enough! With all the hunger and poverty in the world I found that quite disgusting – we all do not look alike, do we !!!!! ?
LikeLike
Please don’t get me started on pretty fruit and veg, eh. It’s a pet rant of mine 🙂
I am pleased to say that some of my photographs of misshapen fruit and veg have been published in magazines to accompany articles about this very topic.
Still, at least the cows will recycle the carrots into milk and meat… every cloud has a silver lining. LOL.
LikeLike
I love this variety, they are juicy 🙂
LikeLike
And meaty!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Nice!! Those big ugly ones are often really tasty.
LikeLike
They certainly wouldn’t win any prizes for appearance 😦
LikeLike
The variety is Rosa, Piglet.
My other half, who you know well, bought 2 Rosa plants at Lagos market and they have grown like triffids – massive plants and massive tomatoes although only about 8 of them.
We’ve yet to try them as they are only just ripening.
LikeLike
Rosa! That’s great, Chip, thanks! We have loads of tomatoes and some are so large I’ve had to support the trusses.
LikeLike