A beloved family oxheart that lives up to every bit of its reputation. Potentially monstrous deep-crimson hearts regularly hit 1–2½ lbs in normal garden conditions (many growers see consistent 2-pounders), with thick, meaty flesh, almost no seeds, and that hauntingly rich, sweet, old-world Italian flavor that tastes like Sunday gravy in tomato form.
 
Wispy regular-leaf indeterminate vines are surprisingly slender for the sheer weight they carry—fruits will snap branches or drag plants to the ground without serious support. Many of us just let them sprawl, but the Tori family secret (perfected by Gildo Tori) is a brilliant stackable open-frame “box” system: build a moat, feed with manure tea, and add a new frame every few weeks while carefully resting each heavy truss on the wood. The result? Absolute giants that look like they belong in a county-fair photo.
 
HISTORY: Brought to Detroit, Michigan in 1949 by Tom Tori from the family’s hillside home in Uzzano, Tuscany, Italy. For decades it was known in the family simply as “the ugly tomato” because of its heavily ribbed, irregular shape. Various Tori family members have grown and shared it across the U.S. ever since. Only in 2015 was it officially christened “Tori’s Italian Bruté.” Today, photos of the original red-roofed house perched high above Uzzano (taken by Gildo Tori himself in 2023) remind us exactly where this living piece of Italian-American history began.
 
Sold as one plant in a 3.5" pot.