Big Malaka

Big Malaka-REVIEW!

Rob likes to grow at least one BIG tomato each year for fun. In my experience, most of these cultivars that claim to be big really aren't, and the ones we've grown just don't taste very good.

Last year, Rob finally got the 2 pounder he'd been wanting through a variety called Large Membranous...and it actually tasted pretty good (you can find my review of this tomato on my Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/p/DDxFyLnPL8I/?img_index=1

I certainly wasn't on the search for another massive tomato, but a friend in Australia sent me a pack of seeds for this rare variety only found in Australia called Big Malaka! Being that it was rare, of course I HAD to grow it! (Thank you Deborah Henderson!) (Not to mention, I'm told that "Malaka" is Green slang for "jerk" LOL)

Big Malaka is a large, ribbed, meaty Greek tomato variety, primarily popularized in Australia by Vasili's Garden, an organic gardening business run by Vasili Damiras (a Greek-Australian). You can find him on Instagram at @vasilisgardenofficial.

Vasili's has a FB page dedicated to hosting annual "Big Malaka Tomato Competitions" featuring giant fruits from growers with videos of harvesting, weighing, and celebrating winners.

So we were intrigued by this cultivar and were very pleased with the results!

Big Malaka was a late season variety for us, and they grew in clusters of 3-4 massive tomatoes with excellent production for such massive fruits. Every single tomato was over 1lb (450g) with some reaching almost 2 pounds! Foliage is regular leaf.

Fruits were bright red beefsteaks with gorgeous deep red interior and ample pockets of the 'good stuff' (seeds and goo!)

I wasn't expecting much for flavor, but we were pleasantly surprised! They tasted rich and tomatoey with an old fashioned tomato flavor. BRIX was a 5.2 which was much sweeter than we expected for such huge fruits!

The flavor lingered and wasn't watery at all. Lots of umami taste with enough sweetness to make it a full-bodied flavor experience. Really such a nice surprise!

We really enjoyed this one and it is most certainly up there in our ranking of large tomatoes that really do get large and have good flavor! Thank you Vasili's for introducing this tomato to the tomato world, and thank you Deborah Henderson for sending me these seeds!

BRIX: 5.2 Overall: 7.5/10