It is an awesome variety if you like sweet tomatoes. Gigantic beefsteaks, huge crop, keeps putting out tomatoes until the end, and delicious. One of my favorites!

Carla in Sac

We grow them every year and are very partial to them. None reach any 5 lbs. - that's ad hype - ;) but I can highly recommend them. There are several past discussions here about them that a search by name will pull up for you if you want to read through them.

Dave

I grew them last year and will not this year. It may have been the weather - none of my toms produced as in previous years, but the three plants I had were not as good as Red Zebra, Golden Monarch, Delicious or Beefsteak.

Did like the color of the juice - almost the same color as a pumpkin. But I only got about 10 quarts of juice.

Mike

I tried Giant Belgium for several years. Never got a tomato over a pound, and most were closer 12 ounces. They no longer have a place in my garden.

I echo all the good things said here and also the cautions against advertising hype. When I grew them last year just a few feet away from Mortgage Lifter, the latter was very similar in every way, but just a bit bigger, more productive, tastier and consistent into the end of the season. GB is certainly better than most freebies, and worth a try. But if you really like it, maybe you should also try ML some time.

Steve

The hype for Giant Belgium has often been associated with its use for making wine and it's a good one for that, so it's said.

Yes, I've grown it, and yes it's OK but there a lot of other large pink beefsteak varieties that I like much better.

Just me and my personal taste preferences and my area and the way I grow tomatoes.

Carolyn

Mike (wordwiz):
Juice the same color as a PUMPKIN? Giant Belgium is a pink tomato--were your fruits pink? I think you may have gotten mixed up seed!

Carla in Sac

Maybe he's thinking of Persimmon, another freebie from Tomato Growers Supply a couple of years back.

I didn't get the seeds mixed up, unless the seed company did. Never heard of Persimmon, at least not the tomato with that name. But yeah, the juice was about the color of pumpkin flesh, a brownish red. The toms were large, between 1.5-2.5 pounds, beefsteak like. Definitely were not pink. Three - four toms would produce two quarts or more of juice.

If this plant wasn't really a Belgium Giant then I don't have a clue what it really was!

Mike

Nope, sure doesn't sound like a description of Giant Belgium. They are a very dark pink and so is the flesh and the juice.

Dave

Grew the Giant Belgium from seeds Dr. Miesner sent me.
It put out large fruit at the bottom and nothing up top until it finally succombed to wilt in late Aug.

Across the garden Earls Polish did the same after both plants reached over 8', and the fruit had to ripen green.

Kinda funny as plants ...such as NAR right next to it produced healthy fruits over a pound.

I wonder if roots reached a contaminated zone , or if the plant was suceptible and croaked as a result.

Had a couple of Giant Belgiums last season, they produced nice pink tomatoes in the one pound range, nothing really special but I will try it again this year. There are a lot of better tasting tomatoes out there that produce much better.
Camo

I've grown Giant Belgium and enjoyed it very much! Yes, my fruit averaged near 2 pounds each, but the plants did not produce a lot of fruit. It appears that Giant Belgium has vastly different results depending on different environmental factors.

It might have been a Yellow -Giant belgium, as there are several other colour variations of it around.

Would you care to trade a few seeds? My father-in-law wants to try these so I said I would look for some seed. I have a few heirloom tomato seed if you are interested.

Gerri

Giant Belgium are one of my favorites certainly in the top ten. Giant Belgium and Georgia Streak we the very first heirlooms I grew years back and remain steady favorites. Size isn't as important to me as taste is. :)

Gerri,

Your seeds were mailed today.

Good luck,

John

anyone ever tried these tomatos in the deep south? someone who used to grow them in Indiana asked me about growing them in Georgia and I would like to try them myself.

Thanks,

Beth in Madison Georgia