I grow tomatoes specially for making into sauce (and occasionally salsa). We don't really eat plain tomatoes at my house. My favorite flavor wise is the black Krim (I like less sweet sauce). But the romas make better sauce. Is there a tomato variety that's basically a cross of those 2?

You could try crossing them yourself and harvesting the seeds to see what you get.

Other than that, if you want to try something with a lot of meat that makes a good sauce but has good flavor uncooked, you can try any number of paste or some other tomatoes. Jersey Devil, San Marzano, Amish Paste among many others. For non-paste tomatoes, kellogg's breakfast was very meaty (good sauce) and had good fresh flavor for me. Bi-color (yellow/red) tomatoes like hillbilly potato leaf, gold medal, and big rainbow might be good to try.

My true black brandywine tomatoes were meaty (again, good sauce potential) and had good flavor too. Carbon maybe, they're smaller but meaty as well.

No one can really say for sure about the flavor, some tomatoes taste like water balloons filled with well water in some climates but may be the best tomato you've ever eaten in another climate or different growing year. The only thing to go off of really is whether they're meaty or juicy, the juicy tomatoes are generally better for salads and sandwiches and stuff, but will take a ton of them to make sauce.

I suppose I could save some seeds this year. My tomatos are very close and growing into each other so it's likely some cross pollinated. I think I've got 1 Cherokee people, 1 roma, 1 black krim, and 1 Italian Roma in one row. My other rows (2 rows of 4 plants side by side) are black Krim, Roma (could be Italian Roma or San marzano) and I think possibly another type. But they all got mixed as seedlings so I don't really know what's what. I can tell the romas apart from the rest based on shape already but they'll have to get fully ripe before I know exactly what's what.

Even though they are all indeterminate, I like how I can get so many in such a small space. The plants just become crazy in August and September. I'm doing a bit better job of pruning them just s little this year so hopefully I don't have too much jungle.

I think I canned around 30 pints and quarts of tomato sauce last year, but had to buy some tomatoes from someone. Hopefully I can get another box of jars and do even more. I do it in the crockpot overnight for pizza sauce.

Maybe next year I'll try a new variety. I'm just looking for the meaty types.

The Black Krim we have commercially available in the West is actually a much modified variety of the original article from Crimea. I grew the original ones around 2005 and they had little resemblance to those sold nowadays. I can definetely understand why the plant needed some improvement as they are prone to stunted growth in the original form (hence overseeding is mandatory) but I think many seed companies have gone too far in their efforts, if they aren't just marketing generic dark tomatoes under the "Black Krim" label. Perhaps you could try an original Black Krim? They are still available through seed swapping circles and from sellers based in Eastern Europe.

Roma is actually a much improved San Marzano hybrid, probably one of the most improved ones as it almost eliminates the parent's vulnerability to Blossom End Rot (BER). There are actually dozens of San Marzano hybrids and "improved" varieties, such as Polyphemus and Scatolone, and they were all developed as sauce/drying tomatoes so they would fit the bill rather nicely.

One final piece of advice is to research what you are planting if you opt for heirlooms. There's one truly excellent sauce/drying cultivar called Principe Borghese but the big problem is it was originally developed for very particular growing conditions (volcanic soil, long spells of dry weather etc). I tried growing it here, where every day there's at least 40% chance of thunderstorms and the nearest (extinct) volcano is hundreds of miles away and while the plants grew to gigantic proportions and set a lot of tomatoes these struggled to ripen and were so bland as to be unsuited for everything bar perhaps decoration. Never again.

My black krim got huge last year (the plant anyway) and there heading that way again this year. Tomatoes themselves ranged in size. Maybe I'll actually weigh some this year. Since I don't like raw tomatoes, I base everything in hope my sauce tastes and I just don't like it when it's really sweet.

I might try those san marzano varieties next year if I can find seeds. I did research before ending up with what I've currently got. Research and 4-5 years of growing them myself have landed me here. This year I was trying to use up seeds so I've got a bit more variety. I don't think things with giant tomatos would work well in my setup though.
Here in Nebraska, weather can do anything. Got 1/2 inch of rain the other night when it wasn't supposed to rain but the previous weekend we were supposed to have 4 days off rain and got none. Fall could come early or late, snow might be done in March or continue until May. Thunderstorms, hail, tornadoes, you never really know.

I can't stand sweet tomato sauce! Or sweet tomatoes. When I make spaghetti the sauce gets a capful of apple cider vinegar. Or even white vinegar if that's all I have on hand. I cannot even imagine adding sugar or honey to spaghetti sauce.

repentantslide said:
No one can really say for sure about the flavor, some tomatoes taste like water balloons filled with well water in some climates but may be the best tomato you've ever eaten in another climate or different growing year. The only thing to go off of really is whether they're meaty or juicy, the juicy tomatoes are generally better for salads and sandwiches and stuff, but will take a ton of them to make sauce.

I agree with all of this but one thing....I like a lot of meat on my tomato...ground beef works really nice about an inch thick and with a little charred crust to it!

Meat gets added when I'm preparing for a meal since I just water bath can. I've never tried adding vinegar. I do add something when canning to make sure it's acidic enough. I usually add more spices when I'm cooking with it later. What I can is pretty basic and I add the extras later (makes it a bit more versatile).