Same observation here but digdirt beat me to posting it. The tomato isn't uniformly ripened due to some stress triggering the outside to ripen ... possibly heat but we don't know the details of your growing. The sugars (and acids to some degree) are not getting a chance to properly develop. It is suffering from mild puffing - the lack of full gel development - likely due to incomplete development, though that is also often found in cooler weather too when there's not enough light/cold - the problem with development is on both ends of the temperature/light spectrum, the tomato has its preferred range.

Cheers

PC

PS, have a look at this thread which is the same question (thread link)

Yea... they are ALL like that. Pretty sad bc there are a lot. Do you think there's any point to letting it continue to grow? Maybe some will come out good?

We had a lot of rain in May and June.. maybe that was why? It's a container plant also.. my other tamotoes taste amazing so I don't think it's the soil. I'm not sure. Just really dissappointing.

"Maybe some will come out good?"

It's unclear what the stress is that is causing it. If your container gets rain in the soil, it could be leaching out fertilizers, together with the plant requiring more to support its production if it is more productive than the others (A marathon gives a bigger appetite than a walk in the park). As soon as you determine what it is ... and there are many candidates and their combinations, if that can be corrected the tomatoes will be fine. If you don't figure it out they still might get better, but that depends on chance fixing the stress.

Cheers

PC

So, try feeding it a few good times? Will it correct the already ripened fruit or should I pull all of them and hope better for the green ones when they ripen?

"So, try feeding it a few good times? Will it correct the already ripened
fruit or should I pull all of them and hope better for the green ones
when they ripen?"

Too bad it sounds like you only have one plant. This is a time when having more plants would be really useful. I think it's likely the heavy rains you described are in part the culprit. The problem with this is nutrient uptake is not always related to what you put in the soil. Since you don't illustrate everything with tons of pictures to give us a better idea of what's happening, the only thing I can answer is what I'd do is to minimize your exposure to the mentioned risks in a general sense:

Remove half of the tomatoes which you hopefully can make use of, that can help the plant catch up if it hasn't already; and just one additional feed if that seems reasonable considering the productivity and feed compared to other plants, but don't overdo it since it might not help and too much fertilizer can hurt depending on what nutrients are available and which ones are somewhat locked out (i.e., potassium).

But since you don't have two plants to compare two different treatments, it is sort of a random, but hopeful shot based on the inclination that the rain was the prime cause.

Cheers

PC

Container? How big? What potting mix used to fill the container? What and how often fed? Watering regimen? All those are common stress factors for plants. Any of those in combination with several others are stress factors. So unfortunately it isn't just a matter of grabbing on to any one factor to fix it. Container gardening of any variety is very different from growing it in ground. So container gardening requires more up-front, early-on knowledge and fixes. They don't allow for the late season fixes that you can do with in ground plants.

An Opalka plant in any container less than 20 gallons starts out with at least 1 strike against it simply because it is such a big indeterminate. So that may be the basic problem and too late to fix. If it hasn't been fed a well balanced fertilizer on a regular basis - weekly for most container plants - then it may well be too late to fix it but is worth a try. If it has been given a consistent soil moisture base then it may be too late to fix. It all depends on how much growing season you have left.

As a general guideline, fixing things now will not help the fruit already on the plant but should help any in very early stages of development and those that develop later. Depending on where you live how much growing season do you have left?

Dave

I've grown Opalka, Heidi, and Viva Italia. The latter having the most flavor, which isn't saying much for a plum tomato.

Try roasting some of them and I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

I just noticed your container is black or dark colored of some sort. Another issue is whether the container is heating up the roots. My experience here in containers is that that arrangement can cause puffiness in the FL heat. If you have a way to shade/wrap the container sides with something, and also put some extra mulch on top of the soil to help cool the roots that could be helpful.

With the heavy fruit load, I'm assuming you still have more new tomatoes developing so removing half and maybe preparing them like Cindy says seems like the ideal course to me. You wouldn't expect instant results per digdirt who I agree with, but taking all those actions will definitely give you a good chance of getting past this and enjoying the new ones coming out starting sooner since the season is going to be winding down. Doing all those things will push you in the right direction, and hopefully finish off better.

Cheers

PC

Probably it is just the way it is. Either not tasty for you or because of its strain or other reason.

"UNEVEN RIPENESS "??, here is a picture from google

It looks the same to me. The outer layer is of darker color than inner parts. also quite a bit of cavity in there. I could see it wrong.

The other thing is that a sauce tomato is not for fresh slicing and eating. When you make a sauce of them, cooking itself and flavoring added to it can make it tastier. JMO

Sey

There are hundreds of pics of Opalka on Google and the majority of them show very differently than the one posted. The uneven ripeness in the OP pics is clear in the contrast between the exterior ripe tissue and white interior tissue.

And Opalka is well known as being the exception to the rule of paste tomatoes. It consistently rates as rich, flavorfull, juicy, not puffy or hollow, and often used and recommended for fresh slicing and eating.

Dave

One other comment about your ripe Opalkas you cut for illustration in the pictures. Somebody else who knows the variety better can kindly correct me if I'm wrong, but you might want to not ripen them so deep red outside. They may be past their optimal point, but the once I had one Opalka plant they always showed slight green shoulders, which if I Google others' pics seem common with Opalka. I'm in FL though so it may vary, since beating down sun is usually a problem here, and maybe in the north the sun simply isn't as destructive to the tomato shoulders.

It is probably a judgement call that others may have, but I think yours, in addition to stressed ripening, are probably being harvested beyond optimum maturity, which can negatively impact the flavor. You may have other preferences, but I'm thinking that you probably left them on due to the rain/heat induced irregular ripening you posted about, longer than you would to try to get the most visual ripening you could.

I'm wondering if it would have been better for flavor to harvest them sooner, or if you were trying to get rid of the green shoulders relating that to the problem inside (which I wouldn't do). That is easy enough to check if there is a doubt.

Cheers

PC

They don't look like the Opalka I've grown, which are longer and almost banana pepper shaped.