The TomTato – A Plant That Grows Tomatoes above Ground and Potatoes Below

Well hello! Great to see you today. Glad you found time to click by. I see you're already holding out your coffee mug so go ahead and fill 'er up! Coax a virtual treat or two onto your plate while you're over there. Hey...do you like gardening? Yeah... I know it's the fall and winter's coming but remember... spring and summer will follow right behind Ol' Man Winter so to my way of thinking, let's get an early start on thinking about next year by looking at what's new in gardening, eh!

An extraordinary plant that produces both tomatoes and potatoes has been developed in the UK. Just one of these ingenious plants can grow more than 500 sweet cherry tomatoes above the ground, and a decent crop of white potatoes below. Aptly named ‘TomTato’, the plant is actually 100 percent natural, and not genetically modified as one would expect.

TomTato, a.k.a ‘veg plot in a pot’, was developed through high-tech grafting by Thompson and Morgan, a horticultural firm based in the town of Ipswich, in Suffolk, England. Although similar plants have been created in the UK before, this is the first time someone has managed to produce a commercially viable version.

According to Guy Barter of the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), taste was a real problem with past varieties, but the TomTato seems to have hit the jackpot.

Saves a lot of time, that does, eh! Soon as someone figures out how to get a chicken to lay eggs and bacon. I've been working on that project for years but my research assistant keeps disappearing. 

Never mind. Just pour a heap of gravy over the whole TomTato bush and we'll get our 'greens' at the same time!

See ya, eh!

Bob