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Scientists have quantified flavor-associated chemicals in 398 varieties of tomatoes in order to create a "roadmap" for improving flavor:
Bite into a supermarket tomato and you'll probably notice something missing: taste. Scientists think they can put the yum back into the grocery tomato by tinkering with its genetic recipe. Researchers are reinstalling five long-lost genetic traits that add much of the sweet-yet-acidic taste that had been bred out of mass-produced tomatoes for the past 50 years. They're using mostly natural breeding methods, not genetic modification technology.
[...] One key issue is size. Growers keep increasing individual tomato size and grow more per plant. The trouble is that there is a limit to how much sugar each tomato plant can produce. Bigger tomatoes and more of them means less sugar per tomato and less taste, Klee said. So Klee and colleagues looked at the genomes of the mass-produced tomato varieties and heirloom tomatoes to try to help the grocery tomatoes catch up to their backyard garden taste.
[...] Klee isolated some sugar genes and ones more geared to pure taste, but figured those won't work as well because they clash against shipping and size needs. So he found areas that affect the aroma of tomatoes but not size or heartiness. Reintroducing those into mass-produced tomatoes should work because smell is a big factor in taste, he said. Altering genes in a lab would make the process faster, but because of consumer distrust and regulations, Klee is opting for natural breeding methods – with help from an electric toothbrush to spread pollen.
It sounds like the quest for a tasty tomato will be delayed for years because GMOs are scaaaary.
Also at NYT.
A chemical genetic roadmap to improved tomato flavor (DOI: 10.1126/science.aal1556) (DX)
Previously: Breeding Wildness Back Into Our Fruits and Vegetables
Two Approaches to Enhancing Tomato Flavor
Tomatoes Grown in Australian Desert from Sunshine and Seawater
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 30 2017, @02:35AM
Because everyone lives next to a farmer's market, right? Oh wait...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 30 2017, @03:39AM
In the US you tend to either live near farmers' markets or near the farmers. There are exceptions like Alaska where there's basically no availability of fresh vegetables during winter when you move further north. But, most Americans have access to at least one of the two.
The bigger issue tends to be the ability to afford to buy the good stuff.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 30 2017, @05:26AM
In the US you tend to either live near farmers' markets or near the farmers. There are exceptions like Alaska where there's basically no availability of fresh vegetables during winter when you move further north. But, most Americans have access to at least one of the two.
Ah, yes. Who can forget those famous areas... The Farms of Manhattan. The Ranches of Chicago. The Orchards of Los Angeles. :)
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Monday January 30 2017, @11:28AM
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday January 30 2017, @04:08PM
That's correct. There are green markets everywhere in NYC. They are amply supplied by farms that, believe it or not, surround the urban area in Long Island, New Jersey, Upstate NY, and Connecticut. It's not a long drive to get to them, either--about an hour, depending on traffic. Many people have an image of NYC stretching forever, but the boundary is more abrupt and comes sooner than you'd think, and then suddenly you're in rural, pastoral settings.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Dunbal on Monday January 30 2017, @01:58PM
If there was demand for it you would bet your ass someone would open a specialty store/section in your supermarket and sell you tasty vegetables for a profit. But that's not going to happen because people would complain about the 40% price difference and continue to buy frozen bulk veggies as they sip on their 1000 calorie artificially sweetened and flavored coffee ground residue at $15 a cup. People SAY they want tasty veggies. But they really don't.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 30 2017, @03:17PM
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Monday January 30 2017, @05:38PM
There are plenty of farmers markets in NYC. We also have Farms out on long island in Suffolk county, though many were converted to wineries. And we still have lots of farms upstate in the rest of NY as well as our neighbors in NJ. And up until a few years ago, the last privately owned farm in Queens closed. I remember walking to it from university on 73rd ave and buying fresh produce before getting on the Q27. Though, the Queens county farm museum is still operational. But I am not sure if they sell produce.