From the first year I tried crossing tomatoes, when I made a cross between Brad’s Atomic Grape x Tim’s Taste of Paradise.

The F1 hybrid between the two looked promising. It was with red and yellow bicolor skin, very faint stripes and an anthocyanin blush. The flavor was light, not bland but also not super sweet or acidic.

The F2 plants segregated into many types, offering combinations of anthocyanin, stripes, bicolor and green flesh. The flavor was only adequate on most, but there was a striped orange one with anthocyanin that had the amazing fruity yet umami flavor of Tim’s Taste of Paradise, but was bigger. I selected it to continue developing and I decided to call it Mandy’s Magic Marbles after my mom.

The F3s continued to have a slightly oblong shape, and the anthocyanin stripes, and a reddish blush on the skin. There were some greenflesh variants still emerging, indicating that the F2 selected had been heterozygous for greenflesh.

The F4 that I selected had a more round shape— appropriate for “marbles”— and a more pronounced reddish blush on the skin, while the interior remained an orange-yellow tone. Most importantly it maintained the flavor of the F2 that I had selected it for- sweet and umami at the same time. Hopefully the F5s continue this phenotype.