Pulp non-fiction - Telegraph Jane Austen wrote to her sister Cassandra, in the autumn of 1813. "Have you any Tomatas?" she asked. Fanny & I regale on them every day. And so they might, if they were home-grown, but today it is a truth universally acknowledged that scarcely a single tomato in possession of a supermarket tastes of enough to be worth the regaling. Light at the end of the polytunnel would seem to be a discovery we report today of the genetic element that makes tomatoes tasty. Mendel would be impressed, but all the scientists have really done is confirm what we knew already: some tomatoes taste nice, and they aren't the ones in the chiller cabinet. Appearance and shelf-life mean more to vendors. But why do we buy them, if we know they'll be a watery pulp? We must need the help of psychiatrists more than geneticists.