Does The World Need A Better Tomato?
The Sporkful

Does The World Need A Better Tomato?

B2Upper-intermediateAugust 31, 202640 min
  • Food

In New Jersey, the tomato is king. Almost a century ago, a scientist at Rutgers University developed a variety that became the tomato that lined grocery store shelves for decades. Now, Rutgers scientists are at it again — they’ve invented a new grape tomato called Scarlet Sunrise. Will it become the next hot item in the produce aisle? How do you even invent a new tomato? And why are new varieties of fruits and veggies becoming more popular than ever? We team up with Kenny Malone from Planet Money to find out, and to see if this hot new toma...

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Rolling hills, farms, the way we just passed a whole bunch of cows huddled together under

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B2 · Upper-intermediate

Comfortable if you already follow TV news

A1 42%A2 36%B1 14%B2 7%C1 1%
  • 92% of the words are B1 or easier.
  • 179 words a minute: natural, fairly fast speech.
  • 191 harder words (B2 and up) in the whole episode.

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0:00

See Kenny, look at how beautiful New Jersey is. Rolling hills, farms, the way we just passed a whole bunch of cows huddled together under a tree to stay in the shade, wagging their tails. Smart cows.

0:22

New Jersey cows are smart cows. Let it be now. That's right. I'm driving through my home state of New Jersey, just 15 minutes from the Pennsylvania

0:27

border with my friend Kenny Malone. host one of my favorite podcasts, Planet Money. And while the cows are very cute, that's not why we're here. So we're here in the great state of New Jersey to explore tomatoes, which is something New Jersey is famous for Jersey fresh New Jersey tomatoes. It sounds like

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