Netherland is quite famous for its ability to grow completely tasteless vegetables. After WW2, people didn't consider taste very important; only appearance, size, cost, and maybe nutritional value mattered, so lots of tasteless vegetables were bred.

Eventually customers started revolting, and now there are plenty of very tasty tomatoes available. They're more expensive, though, and not everybody can afford them. To a lot of people, cost is still a factor. And maybe even more so for export.

You are missing the key quality for which industrial scale produce has been selectively bred over the past century: shippability. The ability to be placed in a box and moved thousands of miles without falling apart is the paramount quality of mass produced produce. Go to a farmer's market, be anything but delicate with a large heirloom tomato and you will understand what I mean.

Since growing myself, I have found a whole new appreciation for vegetables. For all these reasons the stuff you buy in the shop can never be as good (at a reasonable price anyway). It takes very little expertise to grow vegetables yourself, that are better than 90% of the stuff you can buy in the shops.

I disagree that consumers didn't find taste important, but probably was trumped by other factors. The major factor (not mentioned in your list) was a result of the industrialisation of farming and marketing (I.e. supermarkets). Vegetables had to be able to transport and store well, and maintain appearance at the end of that. So process (both breeding and other) were adapted to those goals.

If people found taste so important, tasteless vegetables wouldn't have been so successful. And it wasn't just tomatoes either; the most common potato, the bintje, and later the superbintje, are also famous for having very little taste. In my youth, this was considered normal.

During my student days in the early 1990s, I started buying organic whenever possible, and organic potatoes weren't bintjes. When fellow students came over to eat, they were stunned at the taste. "What did you do with your potatoes?" I just boiled them, nothing more. (I'm a pretty mediocre cook.) They just had no idea that potatoes could taste like that. Tasteless crap was the standard. Even when people could afford better, they didn't know it existed.

When I was kid (in the 80s, in Hungary), we ate according to the season. More vegetable in the spring, more fruits in the summer, vegetables, beans, fruits in the autumn and mostly meats and apples, (oranges, bananas - when they were on sale) in the winter.

Now you can buy everything every time, but even the meat is less tasty. Personally, I'd still rather buy food according to the season.

I don't find it to be better or worse than any other Northern European countries. And I can't find good tomatoes at any price - the more expensive on-the-vine ones smell good initially but only taste slightly better.

In that case, what do you consider to be good tomatoes? If you don't like any of them, maybe you just don't like tomatoes?

>"After WW2, people didn't consider taste very important; only appearance, size, cost, and maybe nutritional value mattered, so lots of tasteless vegetables were bred."

Do you have a citation for or more info about this? Were genetically modified tomatoes introduced after the war? I would have thought that came much later with the rise of Monsanto[1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flavr_Savr

Most fruits and vegetables we eat today have been genetically modified but by selective breeding sometimes over hundreds of year. Take corn for example something that is found almost all over the world its current form is because of genetic modification natural corn looks quite different.

They're not genetically modified, merely bred for specific attributes, like people have been doing for thousands of years.

Just regular evolution with human selection still works fine, with no need to directly interfere in the genetic makeup.

Coming from the southern part of Europe, here in the UK groceries (save for Whole Foods 5pounds a bite..) are almost always tasteless. Except for the apricots at the Turkish deli down the street. I don't know where he gets them from, they are the best apricots I've ever had by far =)

Mediterranean vegetables that taste good are unfortunately luxury products in the UK. You can get good tomatoes, you just have to pay 2-3x as much. It's because the mediterranean diet is a middle class thing, so supermarkets segment the market, because people will pay. Whereas in France, Italy, Spain etc that food culture goes across all classes.

Turkey, perhaps, seeing how they are the biggest producer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apricot#/media/File:2012aprico...

They probably coming from Malatya - Turkey, which famous with its apricots. If you want to taste really good tomatoes ask your Turkish deli for Çanakkale tomatoes or pink tomatoes coming from Turkey.

Italian here. I don't think we really want to "keep the best produce for ourselves" - I'm sure our producers would just like to sell at the highest price. Instead, there is a problem with transportation and timing: if you harvest well-ripened tomatoes, they spoil quickly, which is something big distributors hate. Here you can usually find the best tomatoes in small markets in the right season; tomatoes from big supermarkets are usually pretty tasteless (unless you get lucky or know how to choose).

It's the same reason people tell me that bananas in banana-producing countries are way better than what you can find here: our bananas ripen during transportation, and the end result is very different.

PS: it's much easier to find very tasty cherry tomatoes, but they're also much more expensive.

Quality has a price. If you buy the cheapest tomatoes you get the lowest grade, if you're prepared to spend more you get better quality and more taste.

The Germans are extremely interesting in this respect deriding the lowest quality Dutch vegetables with all kinds of name-calling ('waterbombs') but at the same time they keep buying them because they are cheap.

If you want quality you will simply have to be prepared to pay for it, this goes for many more things than just vegetables.

Germans are not willing to pay money for food. They expect food to be cheap, they don't care too much about the quality of it (in general, of course). Germans sometimes joke about themselves that some of them will spend +1000€ for a barbecue without a problem, yet they'll put the cheapest 0.50€ sausages on it.

I could not disagree more. I actually never met a german who joked about being cheap with food. Quite the opposite is true.

Also the per capita household expenditure on food[1] is above the average of European countries. Higher for example than in the UK or Austria, which have comparable incomes.

[1] https://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/daviz/per-capita-hou...

I live in Berlin and used to live in Vienna - I hear such jokes all the time, that Berliners will eat just about anything as long as it's cheap and won't immediately kill you.

You don't have to go far to see the difference either: Austrians and south Germans are already much more "food-oriented" than north Germans, so this may be a regional thing rather than encompassing the whole country.

I live in Berlin, too. But I never heard someone joking about deliberately eating cheap and/or bad food. Who would do this anyway?

I guess you're talking about various prejudices of others. But that's a whole other topic.

The joke isn't by Germans saying they eat cheap food but by other immigrants saying it about Berliners/Germans (i lived for a much longer in Austria and never heard this said about Austrians).

I think the locals wouldn't joke about themselves that way cause to them the way they are is just "normal".

And surely you've heard Berliners say that Berlin's local food tradition is the Döner (i.e. there is no "local food")? I guarantee you no Bavarian or Austrian would say that about their own food tradition.

(And BTW I have no ill will towards Berlin or Berliners, I think it's one of the best places in the world to live in)

I disagree. I have grown up in Poland, in 70-ties and 80-ties. We were agricultural but poor country with communist economy. The meat - ham and sausage were rationed, so were sugar. Some of largest strikes in 1976 broke out when government attempted to raise the regulated price of sugar. My mom's salary equalled to 8 USD per month at black market exchange rates.

But the quality of basic food stuff was amazing. The real black bread with honey (razowiec) at every shop, good white bread, fresh milk delivered to your door by 6am every morning, cheese, cottage cheese, butter, potatoes, tomatoes, apples. Most people were first generation city dwellers and they knew how to select good potatoes and tomatoes. And it was all dirt cheap.

Now tomatoes - imported or grown in Poland are tasteless and potatoes are just a commodity - you cannot find any tasty variations. Sausages are mostly disgusting and unhealthy - few years ago it had been discovered that multiple companies are using chemical salt (for de-icing roads in winter) in sausages. Ham is mostly water.

The comparable black bread, good cheese, real sausages etc. one can buy in fancy, hipster, organic shops but at prohibitive prices. Prices that lower class cannot afford.

The income levels in dollar term over last 30 years had grown expotenially in Poland, farms are heavily subsidies also through EU CAP.

So how can one explain that the economy cannot deliver relatively cheap and tasty basic food products (at much higher profit margins as the consumers are now more wealthy and more health conscious) - a task that ineffective, communist economy fulfilled with relative ease.

> So how can one explain that the economy cannot deliver relatively cheap and tasty basic food products (at much higher profit margins as the consumers are now more wealthy and more health conscious) - a task that ineffective, communist economy fulfilled with relative ease.

That's pretty simple: Poland is now importing a lot of stuff that it used to grow at home. And since Poland is not the wealthiest country it doesn't get the high priced quality stuff.

A lot of stuff that worked under communism does not work equally well under capitalism until a long period of leveling has passed. And on that front Poland has done exceptionally well compared to some of the alternatives, even so there is still a long way to go.

Incidentally, I lived in Poland before the wall fell, and of course what you should add to your story is that if tomatoes were available they tasted better, but they really weren't available all that often.

Well market supposed to be self-regulating automata aiming at discovery of optimal price at maximum benefit to the consumers. And it is clearly not working like that - both price and quality benefits are nowhere to be fund.

Isn't over 30 years of market leveling enough in case of tomatoes? If the choice is between growing tasteless tomatoes or importing similarly tasteless tomatoes then I am under impression that market isn't working well in that case. At least not for a consumer.

If you are telling me that growing tasty tomatoes at large scale is absolutely impossible under capitalism then I will cry "Komuno wróć" :)

The article that started this discussion is about super modern technology used in farming. It reminds me of old joke about modern farming in USSR - they plow with tractors, they sow with airplanes and they watching bread on TV.

Agriculture is not based on capitalism within the EU. The rate of funds for countries distort the market. It is more similar to the soviet model: this country does heavy industry, this one will deliver timber…

As a Belgian, I'd happily pay x4 to x5 the price of the average tomato you can buy in the supermarket here. But I can't. There's an 80% chance tomatoes are tasteless, and a 20% chance they're amazing. I want amazing tomatoes, every single time. :(

You can learn how to tell them apart if you want. Stepdad was a greengrocer so to me this is second nature but when looking for tomatoes take the smaller ones and the darker ones. They're most likely to be the ones that taste better, even when you pick them from a batch. People instinctively seem to go for the brighter and larger fruits but those are almost always the bland ones.

In my experience smell is the best indicator. You want your fruit to smell like fruit. If it has no smell it doesn't have any flavor either.

Smell and taste are so intricately related that loss of the sense of smell usually translates into a significant loss of the sense of taste so you are absolutely right. But smelling the produce before buying is considered pretty bad form where I live.

I find this really interesting, where in the world would it be considered bad form to sniff a tomatoe before purchasing?

Well, here in NL it certainly would if you went through a crate of tomatoes at the local supermarket and smelled all of them one-by-one.

You've got two nostrils, so sniff them two at time and take half as long.

That got me laughing but being the serious kind I am now wondering if we're wired up in such a way that if one tomato is bland and the other is rich in smell that we can tell the two apart reliably enough to know which is which?

I always think of us as having two eyes, two ears for stereo vision and sound but never think of us as having 'two noses' to determine the direction of a small or two different smells at the same time.

I live in Amsterdam but I always try how strawberries smell before buying. And in my experience they smell the same if they come from true same batch so I only need to try once.

> But smelling the produce before buying is considered pretty bad form where I live.

Doing that in supermarkets here is also looked upon as a bit weird. But I don't care, I prefer to look weird and eat the best tomatoes ;)

The tomatoes themselves don't have a strong smell, though the vines do.

Thanks -- going to put this to the test next time I go shopping!

It's a bit more work and other people might get annoyed with you for rejecting 80% of the produce but it is worth it. Good luck!

Buy this type of cherry tomato, they're nice and still relatively affordable: http://rooi.versuit.nl/media/catalog/product/cache/6/image/9...

They won't beat summer sun grown tomatoes in warmer climates, but they're available all year round.

A bit of sugar and a bit of acidity can boost the flavor of sub-par tomatoes, for example for a sauce.

My favourites, I eat tons of them, from Albert Heijn (common Dutch supermarket). But they're better in the summer, if I'm not wrong.

The Albert Heijn Song

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2yno1z

Refrigerating tomatoes kills the flavor and the nutrients, so like all fruits and vegetables they are best consumed 'in season'.

Albert Heijn tomatoes are terrible. Actually most of the fruit in AH is terrible. Ironically it's also the most expensive.

AH Tasty Tom are pretty decent too.

Tasty Tom is very nice, but they are 2.5x more expensive than these.

Two suggestions:

- smell them. Smell is part of flavor and also correlates with the other parts of flavor. Odorless tomatoes are 90% of the time tasteless

- choose tomatoes which are still attached to a part of the plant when possible. They keep their flavor a bit longer.

"quality" is a subjective term. You can optimise a tomato for color, flavour, longevity, size (automated picking), and several other parameters. The Dutch tomato industry is very good at optimising for what the market demands, that's how it got to be so big. The market apparently demands the flavourless 'wasserbomben', I don't see a reason to put blame at the producers. If the market would demand something else I have no doubt the Dutch tomato industry would be able to provide it (Dutch supermarkets typically sell half a dozen varieties).

The problem with tomatoes is that if you pick them ripe they are fragile. So if they are picked ripe, it makes it more difficult to ship them.

And then this gets exacerbated when the varieties are selected for shipping and shelf life rather than flavor.

The lack of taste is not a problem of when the fruit is shipped. Its a indicator for a lack of stress. The plant is not attacked by insects, fungi and deer. Thus it does not produce the aromatics we expect.

Unfortunately, many people are okay with this and expect it. I honestly can not imagine Netherlands farmers and engineers unable to simulate that stress. So its a purely lack of customers knowing the difference.

Reference for this? Never heard of it before, and doesn't sound likely on the surface.

Waterstress: https://www.growingformarket.com/articles/Improve-tomato-fla...

Fungi-Symbosis: http://orgprints.org/12844/1/12844.pdf

But yes, i was wrong on the water tomato. They simply have been bred to look good and be transportable, disregarding taste.

These don't seem especially strong - an opinion piece and a presentation? The second actually states no effect.

Dutch companies actually grow a lot of tomatoes inside the UK, in greenhouse conditions.

Which are then shipped to the supermarket.

US greenhouse tomatoes are generally bland and watery too.

My garden tomatoes got severely damaged by some fungus this year and barely produced and I'm still not at all tempted to buy store tomatoes.

Applies to more than just tomatoes really, though i guess tomatoes are more noticeable in this regard.

In Germany the tomatoes from Holland are called 'Wasserbomben'.

They are called the same in Holland :)

As an Indian, who has lived and worked in USA, UK, Singapore and LatAM, I can attest that produce in supermarkets in all these geographical regions are tasteless. Mostly because, as someone mentioned below they are now bred for ease of shipping. Even in India, vegetables are slowly going the tasteless route, particularly chillies and garlic, but they are a lot more flavorful than their western world counterparts. I remember as a kid garlics were so pungent, you could smell them from a mile. Not the case anymore.

Devil's advocate: It's possible your sense of smell and taste is less sharp than what it was when you were a kid.

You're killing me. I thought only vision took a hit with age :)

In Sweden we tend to get e.g. tomatoes from the Netherlands, Spain and Morocco. From a consumer perspective it seems random - the price doesn't really factor in at all.

Tomatoes from the Netherlands are almost always tasteless.

Tomatoes from Spain are often tasty, but sometimes tasteless.

Tomatoes from Morocco are sometimes tasteless and sometimes horrible.

So I look for Tomatoes grown in Spain and wish for the best...

Italian, or Albanian tomatoes are the best. You guys live so up-north, that it takes a long time for tomatoes to get there so you are most likely going to get shipped the 1. Tasteless type, that happens to resist longer on shelves, or 2. Unripped tomatoes that get ripened on the way there.

There is a huge difference in taste between in vine ripped tomatoes and the one they are picked up still green.

The northeast US has the same problem. Tomatoes in California are usually pretty good, tomatoes in Boston taste like crap. (the joke is that Boston is the last stop for a tomato truck, before they get thrown in the ocean as trash).

Do they tell you from which region?

Origin country is always clearly labeled. Not harvest date though. :(

Homegrown tomatoes here in Romania are pretty tasty, maybe even indistinguishable from the ones you'd find in Italy. Especially the ones that people in the country side grow in their gardens and, even more so, the late summer, early fall breeds of tomatoes. When you cut one open, you literally want to shove your face in it.

Here's what they look like: http://www.desteptarea.ro/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/rosii-p...

Note: 6 LEI (RON) is 1.2 GBP, but can find them as cheap as 0.8 GBP, depending on the city, market or seller.

The problem is that I don't think we produce enough of them for export as they're only grown naturally, they don't last more than a few days, even when in the fridge, and they are seasonal. Households tipically pick them as they ripen for immediate consumption, sell any surplus on the local markets and, by the end of the season, harvest them for around 10 gallons of tomato juice for winter.

The countryside folk also lack the education to seriously market them, lack the money to produce in larger quantities, etc. Which leads to supermarkets being chock full of import tomatoes though (we also have the Dutch ones) :/

So true - Dutch tomatoes are awful bland tasteless cardboard. Best tomatoes in the world I've tried are in Serbia in the summer, bursting with incredible delicious flavour, perfect complement to their delicious grilled meats and sausages.

My friend lives in Barcelona. I live in Belgium. Tomatoes are just _AMAZING_ there in comparison.

Actually, most vegetables seem to be a lot better in Spain. And I tend to go for the best quality organic veggies I can actually buy in Belgium.

Italian tomatoes are just better to an extent that's almost magical.

And probably you don't know the best... have you ever try a "cuore di bue"?

These are amazing! I grew these in Santa Monica CA a couple of years ago and they came out the size of large mangoes with the best flavor I've tasted in a tomato. http://www.growitalian.com/tomato-cuor-di-bue-oxheart-106-24...

Yeah, the ideal tomato for salads and/or with mozzarella

https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomodoro_cuore_di_bue

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-j3ZxGnMC8

#foodporn

Heirloom tomatoes...

In next door Albania they are called "Zemërkau", which it translates "cuore di bue". Very delish, and fortunately local farmers like to grow them for themselves, so you will always find cheap good ones during the season.

The reason they are really good as they are the most similar to the original wild tomatoes, and less likely to have been modified just because their color and shape as most grocery common tomatoes are.

Fun fact: "cuore di bue" means heart of a bull.

I've had amazing tomatoes of this species, but I've also had many watery ones...so I'm guessing the greenhouse-to-supermarket waterbombing effect is more important than the actual species.

thanks for the recommendation.

the Vorlon is also very tasty

http://t.tatianastomatobase.com/wiki/Vorlon

Dutch farmers recognised this and focused on new/other kinds of tomatoes with much better taste like cherry tomatoes and vine tomatoes.

I've been buying what they call "Plum Tomatoes" and they are much better than anything else I can get here in Sweden. Technically I think they are Grape Tomatoes, as they are quite small.

These are reliably at least fairly good in the UK, too, along with cherry tomatoes (about the same size, but round). Plum tomatoes are a bit firmer and cherry tomatoes are a bit sweeter.

If you compare a typical Dutch tomato to a supersized watermelon type tomato from California, the Dutch tomatoes are ten times more flavorful.

Ten times zero, is still zero ;)

What do you mean by "supervised watermelon type tomatoes"? Are you referring to some of the the huge heirloom tomatoes? I find there yellow ones particularly flavorful. Much better than there Dutch stuff.

i live in Los Angeles, and most of the tomatoes i've found in supermarkets here are low in flavor.

OTOH, if I buy the $5-$6 per pound heirloom varieties, the flavor is better.

even better: tomatoes grown in people's backyards.

> even better: tomatoes grown in people's backyards.

Best tomatoes I've ever had were indeed grown in a backyard. In volcanic soil.

Everyone here is mentioning Italy, but I associate it with Greece. The first time I walked into a grocery in Rhodes I learned what good tomatoes smell like.

Yeah, i stopped eating tomatoes in the U.K. after a holiday in Crete.

There are flavourful varieties such as Tasty Tom or small plum tomatoes, but they are much more expensive at €10 per kg versus €2 per kg for a basic variety and less than €1 per kg for the most tasteless variety.

Even Tasty Tom or small plum from AH are terrible compared what you can get locally in Spain or Italy to give an example.

It's just a fact with the increase in globalisation and specialisation, fruit is picked unripened and is allowed to ripen while being transported and while sitting on the shelves in supermarkets. Nothing beats local produce which has been allowed to ripen on naturally and picked when ready.

Unfortunately that's not a particularly efficient way to farm and also fruit is only available in season this way.

It's not just the tomatoes. Everything in the UK supermarket is quite bad. It's a cultural thing I suppose.

Our cuisine and diet has a poor reputation, but I think some of our actual produce (vegetable and dairy) is not so bad. We don't have the warm or sunny climate for flavoursome tomatoes, but root vegetables grown here can be fine.

It's also common for cows to graze outside for part of the day (true of Ireland and Sweden too). It's subjective, but I think it makes for much nicer tasting fresh milk (compared to the UHT variety that is more of the norm in other European countries).

>We don't have the warm or sunny climate for flavoursome tomatoes

I'd read even as a kid, in English novels, that greenhouses were somewhat common in the UK. Do tomatoes not grow well even in greenhouses there?

I can't tell about your cuisine or what you produce, but what is in your supermarkets is very disappointing.

I think that’s just cultural conditioning. Many of the products found in continental supermarkets are equally disappointing for visitors from the UK :)

Its not culture, it is for the benefit of big companies. The best tasting vegetables also spoil easily. The ones sold in supermarkets are the varieties that can be sold longer, usually with poor flavor.

It's culture that lets them get away with it. If British people valued tasty tomatoes, they wouldn't buy the rubbish in the supermarkets. Everyone would know a guy who can hook them up with the good stuff, for a price, and the geriatric mafia who control the allotments would be rolling around in Bentleys.

Where are you shopping? My experience is that UK supermarkets are normally higher quality (esp in fresh and refridgerated goods) than other countries. Often lower priced too. Supermarkets I've seen in other western countries (Italy, France, US, Finland) have invariably been pretty disappointing.

Nope. Vegetables and fruits are tasteless. If you don't find them tasteless then I'm afraid that you never ate proper ones in your life. And I tried pretty much all the uk supermarkets: Waitrose, M&S, Tesco, Morrison, Sainsbury's, Ocado, Amazon, Iceland, Asda and probably something else that I'm forgetting. And let's not start speaking about the tuna. I have to bring it from Italy. I spent up to 9 or 10£ for all kind of tinned tuna, even in glass and in olive oil and it was absolutely inedible. Whenever I let anyone living here to try my tuna they are so shocked and amazed that I have to give them some tins to carry home. And the tuna fillets in the glass are even better. And what about porcini mushrooms? The only place where I can find them frozen is an expensive Italian shop. In the supermarket you can find only the tasteless dried ones if you are lucky.

Cep/porcini actually grows in the wild in the UK. But there is no tradition of mushroom gathering for food

My experience is the opposite. I find a narrow selection of mediocre goods in the UK, and a much wider variety of high quality products in the continent. I can't get decent charcuterie without going to a deli, and half the French products I want to buy I have to go to Waitrose to get. Everything from beverages to cheese is really limited, typically only two brands in any given category, one of them usually the store brand.

I feel like the UK supermarket industry took The Paradox of Choice too seriously.

> Everything from beverages to cheese is really limited

The UK produces more varieties of cheese (about 700) than any other EU country. A lot of that is from small independent producers. Obviously, you'll find a narrow(ish) selection at the supermarket, but it's pretty easy to find a wider variety from specialist or online retailers.

I found that out very soon in NL where you see mostly Dutch cheese in the shelves and just a very tiny small section with "world" cheese. Cheddar cheese became rarity at home these days.

Seconded. I don't think the parent comment to this has a strong basis in fact. The UK retail sector is one of the most competitive and dynamic in the world. I live in a small town and within 10 minutes' drive I have 3 large supermarkets open 7 days a week, stocking thousands of lines, with products ranging from budget to expensive. There are many smaller grocery shops also open 7 days a week. There is fantastic local produce if you eat in season. For range, price and convenience few other countries are close to the UK as regards mass retail. I studied this in a uni course and also speak from personal experience of living abroad.

It may be competitive, but the utility function isn't flavour or choice, it might be price or convenience or microwave dinners or something.

I speak as an Irishman who had a terrible time merely finding decent bread when I moved here (there is zero good soda bread in any British supermarket, I actually imported and froze mine for the first few years, then I went the bread maker route, until I made my peace and stopped eating bread at home), with a German partner for the past ten years who feels even more strongly about it than I do.

The prices are competitive and the stores are open 7 days a week, but the choice of products is quite bad and limited.

The implication of competitiveness is competition, and one aspect of competition is choice, both of type, and of quality. If you cannot create great tasting food with the plethora of choice available in the average UK supermarket the problem is not with the products on offer. The range and quality are near the best civilisation has ever had to offer.

But why? There's plenty of production in Portugal, Italy and Spain.

You can find plenty of southern Spanish produce in greengrocers (it's usually so ripe it's nearly about to go off). Works OK if you want to eat it immediately.

Are tomatoes grown in the UK more tasty, or is it all the same?

I am asking because I've moved back/forth a couple time between the US and Canada, and tomatoes made in the USA or central/south America are tasteless in the US. When I see tomatoes made in Canada in a US store that's what I buy, no matter what the price is, organic or not. Savoura is the brand that I prefer, but then again, I am not sure it is Canadian, and they make it all over the world and it taste different depending where they come from...

Canadian tomatoes are almost certainly greenhouse-grown, see this earlier HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11919735

So they're plentiful and cheap, but generally lack flavor.

> Presumably, Italy keeps its best tomato produce for themselves and I don't blame them

I think this also comes down to the trouble with transporting those types of tomatoes without loss due to spoilage.

The tomatoes you describe are exact the same as tomatoes sold here in Australia.

These Australian tomatoes have been genetically selected for characteristic that allow them to be picked green, ripen on the way to the supermarket and hit the shelves blemish free.

They look great on the supermarket shelf but their skin is as tough as nails and they pretty much tasteless.

The only

Here in northern Germany if you go to the supermarket and look at the origin of vegetables, most of them seem come from Spain & Italy.

Interesting, as the Netherlands would be closer geographically! But maybe the UK is just far enough from the south-med to make shipping vegetables from there not as economical.

From going through this whole thread. Best bet Tomato rankings are as follows:

1. Homegrown (in good soil) 2. Italian 3. Albanian (heirloom) 4. Spanish

Smaller, darker and more aromatic are generally better (cherry a good bet), and they're all best in the summer. Did I forget anything?

I never buy any vegetables from the Netherlands, just flowers. They're looking good but completely lack taste. They're also grown by heavily relying on fertilizers. I prefer to buy my veggies from Southern Europe when not available locally.

In much of the UK (presumably in the far north it wouldn't work well?) the way to get tasty tomatoes from mid- to late-summer would be to grow them oneself... Of course during the winter tasty fresh tomatoes are unavailable.

Indeed, I wonder how hard those complaining have tried to use local UK produce in season. Go to a restaurant that serves good food using local produce. I do this when I can afford it - I've had some fantastic food, comparable to anything elsewhere in Europe, and some UK fruit and veg is amongst the finest available - a couple of examples - British asparagus, and Yorkshire forced rhubarb - amongst the best available anywhere.

Our winter vegetables are great as well. Leeks, Parsnips and Chard are all delicious.

Oh god roasted parsnips! So good.

I tried that strategy here in the NL and got very nice looking tomatoes but still, watery and tasteless. There is just not that much strong sunlight during the spring months to bring the taste out. I guess it's worse in greenhouses which is where most (if not all) tomatoes are produced here.

Second this. Choose a good variety and plant in good soil and you will have lots of amazing tasting tomatoes, especially cherry tomatoes are super sweet if you let them ripen. I have been doing this for a few years in London and it's always rewarding - will grow a bigger batch next summer.

I was genuinely surprised to find hydroponically grown tomatoes here in the UK that are consistently delicious. They're called 'Pink Temptation'. They're expensive but the taste is worth it.

Step 1. Don't keep your tomatoes in the fridge.

For the most part, you should though.

http://www.seriouseats.com/2016/10/why-you-can-and-sometimes...

I'm always sad at how tasteless are vegetables that you can find in uk compared to Italian ones..