Any tomato breed can be transformed into a purple tomato. And purple tomatoes taste exactly the same as their source varietal because anthocyanines are flavorless.
But [Cathie] Martin’s research found two other interesting things. Her purple tomatoes—not to be mistaken with dark varietals like black cherry tomatoes—last roughly twice as long on the shelf as a standard tomato. And mice that ate a diet of her purple tomatoes lived 30% longer than those that ate the standard red variety.
A human would need to eat the equivalent of two purple tomatoes every day to reach a similar potential benefit… [and] her tomatoes could be cooked down into pasta or pizza sauce. (Yes, these tomatoes retain their captivating purplish hue when cooked).
Related on the SLP
Now she imagines a surprising way forward with her tomatoes. She will give them to the market however the market wants to consume them.
That means she’ll sell you the seeds to grow them yourself. She’ll allow farmers to grow them and sell them to stores to sell to you. She’ll even turn a blind eye on you cross-pollinating these purple tomatoes with another variety in your garden. Martin isn’t protective of her product; she just wants to see it grow.
