EAT YOUR COLORS - August 2024

Which of these are fruits and which ones are vegetables?

This question always seems to confuse a lot of people. The truth of the matter is, the foods pictured on the opposite page are all fruits and none of them are vegetables. I believe it’s because of the way we eat (or the way we prepare) some of those foods is really the reason why some of us are confused. Most people knew from grade school that tomatoes are fruits, but jalapeños, chili-peppers and pumpkins as well? Olives, avocado and okra are fruits too? All squashes, like zucchini and spaghetti-squash are also fruits.

Now before you start arguing with me, keep in mind the simple rule botanists swear by: fruits are the fleshy parts of plants that develop from flowers and contain seeds or a pit. If it has those, it’s a fruit.

Now here’s something else that I think is going to confuse you: strawberries, raspberries and blackberries are not berries at all, but pineapples, bananas, plantains and chili-peppers are! (huh?)

So, then what makes a berry a berry?

In botany, a true “berry” is a fruit that grows from a single ovary. It usually has a slightly soft exocarp (outer peel), fleshy pericarp (middle portion), and soft endocarp (area that surrounds the seeds). Berries grow from a stem, core or stalk of one flower. Peppers stem from one flower and bananas and plantains all grow from one stem too.

What about the pineapple then? Turns out, the multiple scales on the outside of a pineapple are actually individual flowers that have grown tightly together around a central core. In some countries like Brazil (the largest consumers of pineapples on the planet, 11% of the global population)- they eat pineapple one berry at a time. They rip off the leafy “crown” and pull the berries off one by one. By the way, that’s how my father taught me how to eat a pineapple.

He is/was half Brazilian.