The recent boom in sales of heirloom tomatoes are what prompted University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee sociologist Jennifer Jordan to take a closer look at the often misshapen, multicolored-and tasty-fruit.

Her article “The Heirloom Tomato as Cultural Object: Investigating Taste and Place” was published earlier this year in an academic journal.

But the interest in heirlooms of course reaches far beyond academia.

Jordan recently met up with us in the produce section of Fox and Obel on E. Illinois St. in Chicago.

She began by giving us a brief primer on the heirloom tomato.