Experts pick the best quick-ripening varieties for Northwest gardens.

There’s nothing like the flavor of a truly ripe tomato, still warm from the sun and dripping with juices. Some years—last summer for instance, thanks to cloudy days and cool temperatures—we barely get to test whether there’s “nothing like the flavor of truly ripe tomato.” It happens. Here in the Pacific Northwest, we have a long growing season but cool weather dominates for most of it. That’s why tomato-loving northwest gardeners know to select reliable varieties that ripen quickly even when summer heat fails to show up. 

Mother’s Day is one of the high holidays of the growing season; the point at which (usually) the weather has stabilized, the soil is warming and days are getting luxuriously long. It’s finally time to plant tomatoes and you’ll find peak inventory at local nurseries, farmers markets and plant sales. I reached out to a few local experts to ask which tomato varieties deliver ripe fruit—before Labor Day—with rich flavor and a strong growing habit.

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GROW in The Seattle Times