Here’s a little secret: I never used to like tomatoes. Raw tomatoes, with their watery, depressing flesh have always made me shudder a little. But I always suspected this was because these tomatoes were from the supermarket, had been picked before they were ripe, and were a boring variety. And because I adore tomatoes once they are cooked, I started growing them. And, surprise, surprise, homegrown tomatoes came out top.

This year I have grown a nice big bunch of different tomatoes, some heritage, some hybrids. And as the season begins to draw to a close, here’s my pick of the bunch:

San Marzano II: These plum tomatoes cropped and cropped, and are still cropping lovely fat, fleshy fruits. As their bodies contain relatively little water, they are perfect for cooking, and are marvellous when roasted.

Red Zebra: Oh, the lustrous, stripy fruits these plants produced! They were glossy and extraordinarily beautiful even before they ripened, and when they were ready to eat, the tomatoes were marvellous: sweet and juicy, and large enough for a couple of sandwiches. As this is an open-pollinated variety, I will be saving its seeds, ready for sowing next year.

Sungold: Ever since I heard Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall raving about this little hybrid, I had to grow it. It might not be an old-fashioned heirloom variety, but ‘Sungold’ really is a star. It was the heaviest cropper in the vegetable patch, and produced the sweetest, juiciest fruits. They tasted so incredible – Toby described them as a cross between a strawberry and a tomato – that a good number never even made it up the steps into the garden. But even so, every two or three days we picked a bowful from two cordon bushes growing in pots.

Estonian Yellow Mini Cherry: How could I resist an heirloom tomato discovered on a market stall in Tallin? The story behind this cultivar sold me. The flavour is completely unlike any of the other tomatoes I have grown this year: tart and acidic. The one plant I grew cropped very heavily, even though I sowed it rather late and often forgot to water it. A keeper, if only as a good counterbalance to some of the smokier cherries I grew.

Moneymaker: It might seem an odd choice: growing a tomato which you can buy incredibly cheaply in the shops and which is probably responsible for my historical dislike of raw tomatoes. But it came in a set with some spring onion and lettuce seeds, and I decided, rather benevolently, to give it a go. But it’s boring. I don’t care if it crops well and never splits, and transports well. It tastes watery and depressing and I’m not wasting any veg patch space on it next year.

Cherokee Purple: I’m almost ashamed to admit that I was quite reluctant to cut this beautiful heritage tomato open. Dark purple-black brush strokes around the stem fade to a rosy-pink base. This enormous beefsteak plant gave us about seven fat fruits which took a while to ripen into delicious fruits with a complex, smoky-sweet flavour. Another keeper.

Black Cherry: This is, bizarrely, a heritage tomato for wine lovers, as it tastes rather like vin rouge. Yum. And if that wasn’t enough to convince me to save the seeds, the plant produced a heavy crop. Perfect.