Tomato ‘Tommy Toe’, Solanum lycopersicum, is a much-loved heirloom cherry tomato producing generous clusters of bright red, juicy fruit with a wonderfully rich, old-fashioned tomato flavour. Although the fruits are small, their flavour certainly isn’t. Tommy Toe has developed an excellent reputation amongst home gardeners for its sweetness, productivity and ability to keep producing over a long season.

Tommy Toe is particularly interesting for Australian gardeners because it is widely regarded as an Australian heirloom variety. Its precise early history is somewhat difficult to document, but it has been grown in Australian gardens for generations and became especially well known through seed-saving networks and heirloom vegetable collections.

Over the years Tommy Toe has also travelled well beyond Australia and is now grown internationally. It has earned a reputation as an exceptionally flavoursome cherry tomato, particularly amongst gardeners who prefer traditional open-pollinated varieties that can be grown and saved from year to year.

Tomatoes themselves have a much older history. Solanum lycopersicum originated in western South America, with wild ancestors occurring around present-day Peru, Ecuador and neighbouring areas. Tomatoes were domesticated in the Americas and were being cultivated in Mexico before being introduced into Europe during the 16th century.

Tommy Toe produces round, smooth, bright red tomatoes, generally around 2–4 cm across. They are larger than some tiny modern cherry tomatoes but considerably smaller than standard slicing varieties, making them an excellent bite-sized tomato.

The fruit has thin skin surrounding juicy flesh with an excellent balance between sweetness and acidity. This combination gives Tommy Toe the full tomato flavour for which older varieties are so highly prized.

Tommy Toe tomatoes are nutritious as well as delicious. They provide vitamin C, potassium, folate and vitamin K, together with dietary fibre and several naturally occurring antioxidant compounds.

Their brilliant red colour comes largely from lycopene, a carotenoid antioxidant found particularly abundantly in red tomatoes. They also contain beta-carotene and other carotenoids.

Tommy Toe is one of those tomatoes that rarely seems to make it from the garden into the kitchen because the little fruits are so tempting to eat straight from the vine. They are wonderful in salads, lunchboxes, sandwiches and antipasto platters or simply served whole as a fresh snack.

They can also be roasted, grilled or added to pasta dishes and sauces. Roasting concentrates their natural sugars and creates beautifully sweet little bursts of tomato flavour.

Tommy Toe is generally an indeterminate tomato, meaning the plant continues growing, flowering and producing fruit rather than forming one compact crop and stopping. Given good conditions, plants can reach around 1.5–2 metres or more and will appreciate a sturdy stake, cage or trellis.

The vigorous plants produce clusters containing numerous little tomatoes. Once harvesting begins, plants can continue producing for an extended period while warm conditions remain.

Small yellow flowers develop along the stems and are followed by clusters of green fruit that gradually ripen to brilliant red.

Tomatoes are self-fertile, so each flower is capable of producing fruit without another tomato variety nearby. Bees are still very useful visitors because their vibration helps shake pollen loose within the flowers and can improve pollination.

Tommy Toe prefers full sun and fertile, well-drained soil. Incorporating compost or well-rotted organic matter before planting will help support the plant through its long growing and fruiting season.

Consistent watering is particularly important while fruit is developing. Try to avoid allowing the soil to become extremely dry and then suddenly soaking it, as large fluctuations in moisture can contribute to fruit splitting.

Mulching around the plants helps maintain more even soil moisture, suppresses weeds and protects the root system during hot Australian weather.

Tommy Toe is also a lovely variety for gardeners interested in saving their own seed. As an open-pollinated heirloom rather than an F1 hybrid, seed collected from properly isolated plants should produce plants similar to the parent variety.

How to Grow From Seed:

Sow Tommy Toe Tomato seeds from late winter through spring under protection, or during spring and early summer once outdoor conditions are reliably warm.

Sow seeds approximately 5 mm deep into moist, good-quality seed-raising mix. Cover lightly and keep the mix consistently moist but not waterlogged.

Tomato seeds germinate best in warmth, ideally at approximately 20–25°C. Germination generally occurs within around 5–14 days.

Once seedlings have developed their first true leaves and are large enough to handle, transplant them carefully into individual pots.

Grow the young plants somewhere warm and bright until the danger of frost has passed. Gradually acclimatise seedlings to outdoor conditions before planting them permanently into the garden.

Space plants approximately 50–70 cm apart and provide a strong stake, cage or trellis. It is much easier to install the support while plants are young than to wrestle with a huge tomato plant later in the season.

Tomatoes can be planted slightly deeper than they were growing in their pots. The buried section of stem can develop additional roots, helping create a strong root system.

Choose a position receiving at least six hours of direct sunlight each day, preferably more. Water regularly and deeply, particularly once flowers and fruit begin appearing.

Feed periodically with a fertiliser suitable for tomatoes and other fruiting vegetables, but avoid excessive nitrogen as this can encourage enormous leafy plants with fewer tomatoes.

Begin harvesting when the fruits have developed their full bright red colour and come away readily from the plant.

Once Tommy Toe gets going, keep checking those clusters regularly. A healthy plant can produce an astonishing number of little red tomatoes, and with their sweet, rich flavour, quite a few may mysteriously disappear before they ever reach the kitchen.