Plant of the day: Tomato

By far, the most prevalent thing in my garden is always tomatoes. I love tomatoes, especially home grown ones. I can't eat store bought/hot house tomatoes any longer because the taste simply doesn't compare. I've also read Tomatoland which is kind of a downer if you were ever at the store thinking you were making some good choices while shopping.

The good news is you'll never have a better tomato than the one you grow yourself! They taste like actual tomatoes since these ones are grown for flavor.

Common name: Tomato
Scientific name: Solanum lycopersicum
Also Known As: pomi d’oro (golden apple)
An incredibly brief history: A staple of many traditional European cuisines, tomatoes actually originate from South America, specifically the Andes mountains. Strange but true! From there, it made its way to Europe thanks to Spanish explorers by the 1500s. While it seems natural that the tomato would have made its way north, it was introduced there by Europeans as well. Now, you can find tomatoes almost anywhere and are a popular back yard garden veggie.

  Fun facts:

• Tomatoes were once thought to be posionous. The fruit is safe to eat however, the plant does contain Solanine and Tomatine which can be poisonous. The leaves of a tomato plant do have more solanine and tomatine than the fruit and should not be consumed as greens or in large amounts.
• The name lycopersicum means 'wolf peach' because it was once believed that nightshades were used to summon werewolves. 
• Botanically, the tomato is a fruit but is colloquially thought of as a vegetable because of the way we eat it. Furthermore, it's this strange distinction that allowed it to be classified as a vegetable for the purpose of imposing tariffs on the crop in the 1800s. NIX v. HEDDEN, 149 U.S. 304 (1893)