Is tomato a fruit

a Whole Foods Market Customer
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4 Comments

ChrisBird January 16, 2012
Botanically a fruit, but classified as a vegetable for import duty and other purposes. See this great mental Floss article!

http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/57821
 
pierino January 16, 2012
Meanwhile the US Government has classified pizza as a "vegetable" offering in school lunches because it has tomato on it. The tomato is a New World fruit that traveled back to Europe with Colombus. It wasn't accepted as a real food for almost 300 years. But by the 1830's the tomato industry was thriving in the environs of Naples---the birthplace of pizza.
 
susan G. January 15, 2012
From botanist Alex D. Hawkes: 'the tomato is one of those fruits which is most often is utilized as a vegetable.'
There was even a Supreme Court case that ruled on it.
Time-Life The Good Cook -- Vegetables has a section for 'Vegetable Fruits' which include cucumbers, eggplant, tomatoes, peppers, okra.
 
allans January 15, 2012
to be technical, a tomato is a berry, or drupe. a capsule with multiple seed compartments. us congress classified it as a vegetable to avoid excess taxes in the late 1800's (thanks to an early businessman's deep pockets) so you will find it listed as both fruit and vegetable depending on your source.
for practical reasons, tomato's should be considered a fruit - and technically a berry.
 
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