Sunnyside Antiques and Estate Sales

06/05/2026

😊 Front porches, local stores, milk deliveries, and home gardens.

Life felt a little different back then.

06/05/2026

Benny the Bullie has that Friday Feeling...
Happy Friday!

06/05/2026

06/05/2026

Make a difference in your community. Get to know a farmer and local food.

06/05/2026

Heirloom Tomatoes Worth Growing — Plants Your Grandparents Actually Ate

The tomato in your grocery store didn't exist 80 years ago. These five did. 🍅

Modern commercial tomatoes were bred for one thing: surviving a 1,500-mile truck ride. Flavor came second. Or third. Or last.

Heirloom tomatoes are the varieties that existed BEFORE we started breeding for shelf life. They taste like what your grandparents called 'a tomato.'

- BRANDYWINE (1885) — The benchmark. Beefsteak-sized, pink-red, dense, deeply tomato. If you've never tasted a real tomato, start here.

- CHEROKEE PURPLE (1890s) — Smoky, dark-purple-shouldered, almost umami. Said to have been grown by the Cherokee for 100+ years before being 'discovered' in the 1990s.

- MORTGAGE LIFTER (1930s) — Bred during the Depression by a man who sold the plants door-to-door to pay off his mortgage. (He did.) Massive, mild, sweet.

- BLACK KRIM (Russia, 1990s import) — Dark mahogany flesh, slight saltiness, intense flavor. Loves heat.

- MR. STRIPEY (1950s American) — Yellow with red marbling, low acid, almost fruity. The one your grandmother sliced for lemonade-stand sandwiches.

Heirloom tomatoes won't ship. Won't store. Won't look perfect. But the first bite of a real Brandywine and you understand what tomatoes were SUPPOSED to taste like.

All five are still widely available as seeds and seedlings. Plant one. Just one. You'll never go back.