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A Genetic Fix to Put the Taste Back in Tomatoes

nytimes.com

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Re: A Genetic Fix to Put the Taste Back in Tomatoes

#81

Post by ooqr »

Eric_WVGG wrote: post #10

There's a similar problem with popcorn. Showing my age card here, but back in the 1970's popcorn actually tasted like corn , which seems to be a difficult concept to explain to anyone under 40. It all went south around the same time that microwave popcorn became popular. People always ask if I don't like tomatoes when I eat around them in salads or remove from burgers. Nope, I love tomatoes, that's why I don't eat fl…

I thought I disliked tomatoes as a kid, eating around them as you describe. Only when I discovered garden-grown cherry tomatoes did I flip the other way. So far the other way I'm surprised I didn't get sick eating so many of them. They're incredible.

Re: A Genetic Fix to Put the Taste Back in Tomatoes

#82

Post by [deleted] »

djsumdog wrote: post #3

From their website: > The University of Florida has released our first two hybrids. We are in discussions with seed companies about licensing. I hope they allow people to save seeds. They should patent all their source seeds immediately and mark them as open/allowing people to use any without worry of patents. Farmers will need to be careful as always. Any seeds that happen to get cross pollinated with seeds from the…

[deleted]

Re: A Genetic Fix to Put the Taste Back in Tomatoes

#84

Post by ridgeguy »

oppositelock wrote: post #40
tetraodonpuffer wrote: post #14

amazing tasting tomatoes still exist around the world, if you are on vacation in Italy in the summer buy some "cuor di bue" tomatoes at the supermarket and they will be amazing. Of course if you happen to know somebody that grows them and you can pick them off the plant they will be even more incredible, but even the "normal" supermarket ones are going to be orders of magnitude tastier than anything you can find in N…

Amazing tasting tomatoes are also very easy to grow yourself. Tomatoes are a hardy vine, and hard to mess up, you just need plenty of sunshine. There are seeds available for many heirloom varieties, and when you grow them yourself, you pick them at the peak of freshness. I particularly like the Early Girl variety. It's a bummer that you can't re-plant the seeds from most tomatoes, which are F1 hybrids, so the next ge…

I'll underline the "need plenty of sunshine".

We've planted tomatoes for 16 years (hope springs eternal) in the SF Peninsula hills and gotten nearly nothing in return. Our next-door neighbor has far better sun exposure, and she gives us most of the tomatoes we eat in summer.

Re: A Genetic Fix to Put the Taste Back in Tomatoes

#86

Post by roel_v »

Eric_WVGG wrote: post #10

There's a similar problem with popcorn. Showing my age card here, but back in the 1970's popcorn actually tasted like corn , which seems to be a difficult concept to explain to anyone under 40. It all went south around the same time that microwave popcorn became popular. People always ask if I don't like tomatoes when I eat around them in salads or remove from burgers. Nope, I love tomatoes, that's why I don't eat fl…

I don't have the reference at hand, but I read a paper a few months ago that explained this. You prefer flavors you grew up with. Flavors change, so as you get older, you think flavors get worse. Except they don't, the double blind testing showed age cohort related preference clustering, but no proof for 'everything was better in the old days'. This study was for strawberries but I don't see why it would be different.

Re: A Genetic Fix to Put the Taste Back in Tomatoes

#87

Post by [deleted] »

tornadoboy55 wrote: post #75
Eric_WVGG wrote: post #10

There's a similar problem with popcorn. Showing my age card here, but back in the 1970's popcorn actually tasted like corn , which seems to be a difficult concept to explain to anyone under 40. It all went south around the same time that microwave popcorn became popular. People always ask if I don't like tomatoes when I eat around them in salads or remove from burgers. Nope, I love tomatoes, that's why I don't eat fl…

Pro tip: never eat canned goods. The coating inside of them is loaded with endocrine disruptors. Edit: nice to see downvotes without any discourse. Keep it up HN! https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/endocrine/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2726844/

[deleted]

Re: A Genetic Fix to Put the Taste Back in Tomatoes

#88

Post by abrookewood »

tornadoboy55 wrote: post #75
Eric_WVGG wrote: post #10

There's a similar problem with popcorn. Showing my age card here, but back in the 1970's popcorn actually tasted like corn , which seems to be a difficult concept to explain to anyone under 40. It all went south around the same time that microwave popcorn became popular. People always ask if I don't like tomatoes when I eat around them in salads or remove from burgers. Nope, I love tomatoes, that's why I don't eat fl…

Pro tip: never eat canned goods. The coating inside of them is loaded with endocrine disruptors. Edit: nice to see downvotes without any discourse. Keep it up HN! https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/endocrine/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2726844/

Do you have anything showing that these are used in canned foods?

Re: A Genetic Fix to Put the Taste Back in Tomatoes

#89

Post by feld »

gmarx wrote: post #65
zZsFBVZ9bjdJd wrote: post #8

Temple Grandin had some interesting thoughts on how single trait breeding can lead to adverse affects in her discussion on "Rapist Roosters", and how this relates to software[0]. It seems like this is also happening here. Typically when single trait breeding leads to an adverse, undesirable affect (lack of taste), while the selected trait was obtained (in this case, possibly bigger size) breeders don't start from scr…

That explains why most every dog breed that competes on looks and becomes popular gets messed up. Also American breeders have this odd habit of taking large dogs that should be about 80 lbs and breeding them into behemoths, usually to the detriment of the dogs

Russians did this with the German Giant Schnauzer and created the Black Russian Terrier. Their Giants are also significantly larger than the ones with German heritage, but both are recognized as the same breed.

Re: A Genetic Fix to Put the Taste Back in Tomatoes

#90

Post by Retric »

roel_v wrote: post #86
Eric_WVGG wrote: post #10

There's a similar problem with popcorn. Showing my age card here, but back in the 1970's popcorn actually tasted like corn , which seems to be a difficult concept to explain to anyone under 40. It all went south around the same time that microwave popcorn became popular. People always ask if I don't like tomatoes when I eat around them in salads or remove from burgers. Nope, I love tomatoes, that's why I don't eat fl…

I don't have the reference at hand, but I read a paper a few months ago that explained this. You prefer flavors you grew up with. Flavors change, so as you get older, you think flavors get worse. Except they don't, the double blind testing showed age cohort related preference clustering, but no proof for 'everything was better in the old days'. This study was for strawberries but I don't see why it would be different…

Alternatively, younger people don't know what they are missing. As the article points out it's not a sudden drop it's a low change over time where A is almost as good as B and B is almost as good as C ... until it's cardboard.

I have done this experiment with Apples and Oranges kids really prefer the full flavor options and they are not just preferring their childhood tastes as they are still kids.

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