TOMATO • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Tomato

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/təmˈeɪtˌoʊ/ /təmˈɑtˌoʊ/ Listen

noun

Tomato n. (pl. tomatoes) (Bot.) The fruit of a plant of the Nightshade family (Lycopersicum esculentun); also, the plant itself. The fruit, which is called also love apple, is usually of a rounded, flattened form, but often irregular in shape. It is of a bright red or yellow color, and is eaten either cooked or uncooked.

Tomato gall (Zool.), a large gall consisting of a mass of irregular swellings on the stems and leaves of grapevines. They are yellowish green, somewhat tinged with red, and produced by the larva of a small two-winged fly (Lasioptera vitis).

Tomato sphinx (Zool.), the adult or imago of the tomato worm. It closely resembles the tobacco hawk moth. Called also tomato hawk moth.

Tomato worm (Zool.), the larva of a large hawk moth (Manduca quinquemaculata, Protoparce quinquemaculata, Sphinx quinquemaculata, or Macrosila quinquemaculata) which feeds upon the leaves of the tomato and potato plants, often doing considerable damage. Called also tomato hornworm and potato worm, and in the Southern U. S. tobacco fly.

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Etymology of 'Tomato'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Tomato" Quotes from Famous Books

... It was a trying time, and it took all the fortitude I had to look hopefully forward toward a day when things would begin picking up and the wheels of industry would whirl again. The idle men who had camped by the railroads had drunk their water from, and cooked their mulligan stews in, tomato cans. The tin can had become the badge of hoboing. The tin trade was new in America and I foresaw a future in the industry, for all kinds of food were now being put up in tin, whereas when I was a child a tin can was rarely seen. I decided that two trades were better than one, ...

— The Iron Puddler • James J. Davis

... quantity: Doxsee's clam juice, and little neck clams; cream of peas, etc.; vermicelli; tapioca; tomato; clear ...

— Intestinal Ills • Alcinous Burton Jamison

... in South Harvey. All over the place I find its roots—the shrivelled parching roots of self-respect, and the aspiration that grows with self respect. Sometimes I see it in a geranium flowering in a tomato can, set in a window; oftentimes in a cheap lace curtain; occasionally in a struggling, stunted yellow rose bush in the hard-beaten earth of a dooryard; or in a second hand wheezy cabinet organ in some front bedroom—in a thousand little signs ...

— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White

... two weeks ago; and now what is it? A desert, a Sahara strewn with tomato-cans and ashes. No, no, Ezekiel. Winning a prize isn't enough for the Civic League—nor for God," she announced, sententiously. "You've ...

— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly

... parts of the flower which have been suppressed. It must not be overlooked that this adhesion of one flower to another is a very common occurrence under natural circumstances, as in Lonicera, in the common tomato, in Pomax, Opercularia, Symphyomyrtus, &c., while the large size of some of the cultivated sunflowers is in like manner due to the union of two ...

— Vegetable Teratology - An Account of the Principal Deviations from the Usual Construction of Plants • Maxwell T. Masters

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