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October 2008 Spotlight on…Tomato Flavor Where Has All the (Tomato) Flavor Gone? By Cindy Rovins, agricultural communications editor, Peter J. Nitzsche, Agricultural and Resource Management agent and Jack Rabin, associate director of Farm Programs, Rutgers NJAES

Even if you’re not from New Jersey, you’ve likely heard about the legendary taste of the Jersey Tomato. Many of us can close our eyes and remember holding a firm, deep-red tomato, still warm from the sun, with that fresh-off-the-vine smell. The flesh was smooth and each tangy bite was full of juicy flavor. Is this just a memory or can you still find this toma

The mission of the Rutgers NJAES Rediscovering the Jersey Tomato initiative is to identify a portfolio of varieties with solid commercial horticultural performance, which also offer that missing flavor. One of the first places to look is at the old-time tomato varieties that farmers and gardeners associate with that old-fashioned Jersey Tomato taste. These traditionally flavorful varieties are being grown on Rutgers NJAES research farms and are being evaluated for growing performance and taste.

We specifically selected cultivars for evaluation that were commercial F-1 hybrid releases from the 1960s and 1970s. These post-WWII releases had the best F-1 hybrid vigor, multiple disease resistance, yield, and

fruit quality of their time. Yet, this portfolio of varieties was also developed and released before fruit firmness to withstand long-distance shipping was added as a primary breeding goal. While some varieties are too soft for distance shipping, they offer wonderful traits for regional markets when harvested at breaker to pink.

Peter Nitzsche with Ramapo tomatoes. Photo by Jack Rabin.

Some tomato flavor advocates offer that fruit firmness and consumer preference are negatively correlated. While there may be a general trend supporting that opinion, our studies included some current firm varieties that consumers revealed a preference for in blind taste test evaluations. We have not ignored evaluating today’s best varieties for consumer preference. Back by Popular Demand: the Ramapo Tomato

The part of the project that has been most noteworthy for resurrecting tomato flavor, however, has been the return of one of the varieties that was known and loved for its flavor, but was missing from the seed catalogs—the Ramapo tomato.

Rutgers Professor Emeritus of plant breeding, Bernard Pollack, released this hybrid variety tomato in 1968 and it soon became a favorite among gardeners and local growers. Not only was it flavorful, but it was resistant to cracking and common diseases. Despite a loyal following for this tasty and well-performing tomato, commercial seed companies eventually stopped supplying Ramapo seeds to make way for higher-yielding modern varieties. Its disappearance left many disappointed gardeners and growers in its wake, many of whom contacted Rutgers requesting Ramapo seeds. After complying for a number of years by producing small batches of Ramapo hybrid seed from the parent lines, Rutgers NJAES sought commercial companies to

produce the seed. After several rejections from companies only interested in producing sizeable quantities, Rutgers finally found one willing to produce an amount suitable for its budget.

Forty years after its introduction, the Ramapo seed was re-released in spring 2008 and has been enthusiastically received by gardeners, local growers, and tomato lovers alike. The Ups and Downs and Ins and Outs of Tomato Plant Breeding

In a recent interview, Dr. Pollack, now retired and residing in California, explained why many of today’s commercial varieties of red round tomatoes don’t have the taste and texture of the old varieties. According to Dr. Pollack, “If you tasted Rutgers, Stokesdale, Earliana, Marglobe, Pritchard, Big Boy, and Early Girl, they would all taste very much like Ramapo. I would expect this since we plant breeders were all using germplasm from the same gene pool. We were looking for yield—disease resistance helped—maturity, quality, and crack resistance, and all of these varieties and hybrids met at least one of these criteria. (These were for the fresh market tomatoes, not processing tomatoes). Yet, trends change and shipping quality, shelf life and hardness became the vogue in contemporary plant breeding. However, these modern plant breeders never got out in the field and tasted their product.”

Since the Ramapo tomato is a hybrid tomato, many people wonder what the difference is between hybrid varieties and open-pollinated varieties. Unlike open-pollinated varieties, hybrids are produced by cross pollinating two parent lines. The resulting progeny, or F1 generation, has the desired characteristics of both parents, but if the seeds from the F1 are saved to produce more plants (F2), very few progeny will be similar to the F1, but most will be more like the parents that were crossed to make the hybrid. Seeds saved from open-pollinated varieties will remain true to the original variety because they are genetically stable.

Why do plant breeders prefer the development of hybrid varieties for certain crops? Hybrids exhibit plant vigor, which is manifested in increased size, growth rate or other qualities resulting from the F1 generation crosses between inbred lines.

The process of inbreeding to develop parent lines is a long arduous process. As Dr. Pollack explains, it requires years of in-breeding the parent lines until they are “pure.” Once the in-bred line is pure and no longer segregates (this usually takes seven years), then the breeder tests the crosses (between two parent lines) in the field and looks at the progeny (F1 hybrid). The Ramapo’s parents were KCA, a line from Campbell’s Soup that was resistant to fusarium wilt, and Abbie, named for Dr. Pollack’s daughter, which was resistant to verticillium. Abbie’s origins were from an early-maturing line from the University of North Dakota, which was still segregating until Dr. Pollack achieved a pure line, which in this case took longer than seven years.

So that’s where plant breeding starts, but the bottom line is it ends with consumers’ taste buds. While produce shippers and receivers favoring standard shipping varieties make the purchasing decisions that tell the farmers what type of tomato to grow, many dissatisfied consumers look for alternatives by seeking local growers that provide more flavorful vine-ripened varieties through direct-market outlets such as farm markets. Ramapo tomato seeds are available from Eastern Seed Services, LLC, 1136 Route 45, Pilesgrove, NJ 08098, Ph. 856-769-7911, Fax 856-769-7913, e-mail joe4seeds@yahoo.com. Note: Recent field trials by Rutgers NJAES have shown the Ramapo Tomato to be a mid- to late-season maturing variety, with lower yields and softer fruit than some standard fresh-market cultivars. Growers, packers, shippers, and marketers may need to alter their post-harvest practices in order to get Ramapo fruit to market to consumers at peak quality.

Faculty and Staff Activities and Accomplishments Rutgers NJAES officially opened its new 23,000-square-foot Food Innovation Center business incubator and food-processing facility on October 17. The grand opening and ribbon-cutting event took place at the state-of-the-art facility on 450 E. Broad Street in Bridgeton.

Margaret Brennan, director of economic development for the NJAES and a founder of the center, indicated, "Approximately 90 percent of the construction funding for the FIC incubator facility originated from outside of the university, which illustrates the tremendous support that the FIC has received from our partners." Construction and operations funding for the FIC originated from federal, state and local agencies, and has included Rutgers NJAES, the U.S. Economic Development Administration, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the State of New Jersey, the New Jersey Casino Reinvestment Development Authority, the New Jersey Commission on Science and Technology, the New Jersey Department of Agriculture, the Cumberland Empowerment Zone, and the City of Bridgeton.

Food Innovation Center clients include farmers and rural cooperatives, startup food companies, existing small and mid-sized food establishments and retail and foodservice markets that seek to purchase locally supplied New Jersey products.

A clip of the ABC Action News 6 report can be found at http://tinyurl.com/6xw9lh.

Grants Five proposals were chosen for FY09 funding through the NJAES Competitive Hatch Awards program. They are: Dawn Brasaemle, PI; Joseph Dixon, Anita Brinker, Co-PIs (Nutrition); and George Carman, Co-PI (Food Science). Adipocyte lipidomics: Contributions of phospholipid metabolism to adipocyte lipolysis. Thomas Leustek, PI; and Melinda Martin, Co-PI (Plant Biology & Pathology). Correlating amino acid homeostasis and gene expression in Arabidopsis thaliana – identifying global regulators. Mehmet Uzumcu, PI (Animal Sciences). Neonatal GFP ovary transplantation: A robust experimental system to study direct effects of endocrine disruptors on the ovary. Malcolm Watford, PI (Nutrition). The role of glutamine in the development of obesity related insulin resistance.

Lori White, PI; and Max Häggblom, Co-PI (Biochemistry and Microbiology). Effect of brominated flame retardants on matrix metabolism in the developing zebrafish (Danio rerio). Awards ranged from $11,500 to $15,000 per year for 2-3 years, with funding for years beyond FY09 contingent on meeting requirements outlined in the original call for proposals. The Northeastern IPM Center recently awarded seven grants through the Northeast Regional IPM Competitive Grants Program. This program focuses on addressing real-world IPM challenges through research, outreach, and education, supporting projects that develop individual pest control tactics, integrate tactics into IPM systems, or develop and implement extension and education programs. These projects address IPM stakeholder priorities, benefit the northeastern region, involve environmental stewardship, and show a high likelihood of success. In fiscal year 2008, the program awarded $571,000 to seven projects, including:

• Development of novel application technology for the control of the Asian tiger mosquito in urban environments (George Hamilton, Rutgers Univ.)

Nicholi Vorsa (co-PI), Jennifer Johnson-Cicalese, and Ajay Singh (all of Marucci Center for Blueberry and Cranberry Research and Extension), along with James Polashock (USDA-ARS) and Kim Patten (Washington State University), were notified of a $996,687 USDA Specialty Crop Research Initiative grant for “Breeding and genetics of fruit-rot resistance and polyphenolics in the American cranberry.” Outreach Efforts: Public/Community Service Troy Brook Regional Stormwater Management Implementation Project The NJAES Water Resources Program and the Whippany River Watershed Action Committee completed the first Regional Stormwater Management Plan in New Jersey that complies with the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection’s new regulations. This plan is for the Troy Brook Watershed, which encompasses portions of three municipalities in Morris County: Mountain Lakes, Parsippany-Troy Hills, and Hanover. The plan identifies specific watershed management projects that will help mitigate the flooding issues, as well as the water quality issues in the watershed. NJDEP has just awarded the RCE Water Resources Program $471,000 to begin the implementation of the recommendations in the plan. These funds were made available through NJDEP’s 319(h) Program, which is focusing efforts on funding the implementation of watershed plans across New Jersey. The State is targeting their support in areas where they believe significant water quality improvements can be made, ultimately cleaning up waterways to such an extent where that they can be removed from the official “impaired waterways” list. To complement this project, the Water Resources Program has been provided some limited funding from NJAES to conduct water quality and flow monitoring of the Troy Brook to develop a complete characterization of stream health prior to the implementation of the Regional Plan. Additional data will be collected during the course of this project to clearly document the water quality improvements that result from the implementation of the Regional Plan. For additional information on this project, please visit www.water.rutgers.edu.

Mark Your Calendars! South Jersey Nursery Meeting WHEN: October 23, 8:30–4:30 WHERE: Cumberland County Extension, 291 Morton Ave., Millville, NJ WHAT: Focus of the meeting will be water. 2 units Core, 3 units category PP2, 3A, and 2 units category 10. $15; registration required. MORE INFO: http://events.rutgers.edu/pdfs/08_SJ_Nursery_Trifold.pdf; phone: 856-451-2800. Stalin vs. Science: The Life and Murder of Nikolai Vavilov WHEN: October 27, 2008 2–4:30 P.M. WHERE: Zimmerli Art Museum WHAT: Peter Pringle is the author or coauthor of nine previous books, including the bestselling Those Are Real Bullets, Aren't They? He was a foreign correspondent for The Sunday Times (London) and The Observer (UK), and a former Moscow bureau chief for The Independent (UK). He has also written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, The New Republic, and The Nation. He lives in New York City. The lecture will be followed by a book signing and reception. Annual Equine Science Update WHEN: December 9, 6–9 p.m. WHERE: Cook Campus Center on Rutgers G.H. Cook Campus WHAT: The Equine Science Update, geared to professionals, horse owners, farm owners and managers, students, science teachers, 4-H horse program participants and educators, will include presentations highlighting the Equine Science Center’s work in advancing equine health, horse management practices, and solutions to equine industry issues. The event starts with a supper at 6 p.m. Optional tours prior to the update include a visit to the current crop of weanlings in the Young Horse Teaching and Research Program at 4 p.m. and a demonstration of the center’s high-speed equine treadmill at 5 p.m. The seminars and tours require reservations, which can be made by calling 732-932-9419 or emailing ESC@njaes.rutgers.edu. The suggested donation for the day’s activities, including the supper, is $25 for adults and $10 for students. This report is produced by the Office of Communications. For information or to provide comments, please contact Amanda Kolling at kolling@njaes.rutgers.edu or 732-932-7000, ext. 4205.

mailto:kolling@njaes.rutgers.edu