An essential food group, as essential as dairy, meat, and junk food. According to the most accurate food pyramid I could find, fruits and vegetables are actually now considered separate groups in society, but which one is actually better?
To figure this we must examine various factors: 1) Definition 2) Taste 3) Nutritional Health 4) The Big Picture & 5) Word Usage
Part 1. Definition
Let’s first look at Merriam Webster’s dictionary to distinguish between a “fruit” and a “vegetable”.
Fruit: a : a product of plant growth (as grain, vegetables, or cotton) <the fruits of the field>b (1) : the usually edible reproductive body of a seed plant;especially : one having a sweet pulp associated with the seed <the fruit of the tree> (2) : a succulent plant part (as the petioles of a rhubarb plant) used chiefly in a dessert or sweet coursec : a dish, quantity, or diet of fruits <live on fruit>d : a product of fertilization in a plant with its modifiedenvelopes or appendages; specifically : the ripened ovary of a seed plant and its contentse : the flavor or aroma of fresh fruit in mature wine
a : of, relating to, constituting, or growing like plantsb : consisting of plants : vegetational
Part 2. Taste
Which one actually tastes better? Let’s examine a list of fruits and vegetables in order to figure this out.
Fruits: Blackcurrant, Redcurrant, Gooseberry, Tomato, Eggplant, Guava, Lucuma, Chili pepper, Pomegranate, Kiwifruit, Grape, Cranberry, Blueberry, Pumpkin, Gourd, Cucumber, Melon, Orange, Lemon, Lime, Grapefruit, Blackberry, Raspberry, Boysenberry, Pineapple, fig, Mulberry, Hedge apple, Gaultheria procumbens, Strawberry
Vegetables: broccoli, cauliflower, globe artichokes, Sweetcorn (maize), peas, beans, kale, collard greens, spinach, beet greens, turnip greens, endive, lettuce, leeks, Brussels sprouts, capers, Kohlrabi, celery, rhubarb, cardoon, asparagus, bamboo shoots, and gingerpotatoes, Jerusalem artichokes, sweet potatoes, and yams, soybean (moyashi), mung beans, urad, and alfalfa., carrots, parsnips, beets, radishes, rutabagas, turnips, and burdocks, onions, shallots, garlic,
Fruits in the botanical sense, but used as vegetables: tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, zucchinis, pumpkins, peppers, eggplant, tomatillos, christophene, okra, breadfruit and avocado.
UM, okay. I will list my top 10 fruits and vegetables and assign points on how I think they taste based on it :).
Fruits:
1) Watermelon [+4 for being sweet]
2) Coconut [+2 for being cute]
3) Strawberries [+3 for being delicious]
4) Pomegranate [+1 for taste, not very easy to eat though :(]
5) Pumpkin [+3 for making good pumpkin pie]
6) Banana [+2 for taste, abnormal shape]
7) Plumbs [+3 for good sour ones]
8) Mango [+2 for good inside, can’t eat skin.]
9) Kiwi [+4 for being sour]
10) Oranges [+1 for not very good taste]
Fruit total = 25
Vegetables:
1) Corn[+4 for taste]
2) Celery [+4 for having negative calories]
3) Carrots [+2 cause good in soup]
4) Potatoes [+4 for french fries]
5) Yams [+1 for reminding me of yam nart]
6) Cauliflower [+2 for healthiness]
7) Broccoli [+1 for color]
8) Spinach [+1 just cause]
9) Lettuce [+2 cause okay in salad]
10) Tomatoes [+2 because it can be good in hamburgers, but technically also a fruit]
Vegetable Total = 23
Part 3. Nutritional Health
It doesn’t take a genius to realize that vegetables are healthier than fruits. Containing first and foremost less sugar, you need more of it as a daily intake than fruits for a reason. The point goes to vegetables, making it 25 to 24.
Part 4. The Big Picture
Getting 5 fruits and vegetables a day seems a bit unrealistic. I mean, come on. The amount of food they want us to eat will inevitably make us fat. HOWEVER, let’s look at the ultimate food pyramid for a bigger picture.
Considering the food pyramid changed in recent years being completely knocked upside down, we have to look at what goes best with the other parts of the food pyramid. What goes better with grains, milk, meat and beans? The answer is simple. Vegetables. Simply put, vegetables are more versatile in their usage than fruits are. While fruits make a nice snack, vegetables make a good part of one’s daily living and intake, and simply more incorporable into other food groups.
Thus, the score is tied between fruits and vegetables: 25 to 25.
Part 5. Word Usage
It all goes down to this: word usage. Fruits and vegetables are both nouns, respectively, but fruits has more of a usage than vegetables do. You can call someone a fruit, offending them in more ways than you would imagine. Some would say this is a bad thing, but I would say because a “fruit” is not only a plant, but also an insult, it gets the extra point, putting it over vegetables.
In the end, fruits win 26 to 25.
What do you think?
You spelled “plums” wrong, by the way (you wrote “plumbs”). Also, you may have 5 categories, but 25 of your fruit points all come from taste, whereas 23 of your vegetable points come from taste. Don’t you think since fruits scored higher on taste, that means that fruit gets +1 point for taste, and not the actual count from the list? So, overall, the actual score would be +2 for fruits (+1 for taste, and +1 for word usage–should be pretty trivial, though, and not even worth a full point–I mean, for an insult like that–who even uses that as an insult nowadays?), and +2 for vegetables (+1 for nutritional health and +1 for big picture, both of which should be more important than word usage). So, looking at the categories, it should either be a tie or the win should go to the vegetables.
Is eggplant really a fruit? I hate eggplants.
Lol plumbs 😛 fruits as a whole taste much better than veggies and are more accessible. whenever i need a snack, i’d rather much rather get some ice cold tangerines
Thanks for your “fruits in a botanical sense, but used a vegetable” list. It was both informative and written beautifully ^^