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Fun Facts About Tomatoes
Tomatoes are a versatile and popular ingredient found in many different recipes and diets. While technically a fruit, it’s largely classed as a vegetable by nutritionists. Tomatoes are a crowd-pleasing favourite and are a staple ingredient in many meals in many cultures across the world. They also have many health benefits including being a source of vitamin C, potassium, folate, and vitamin K.
1. Tomatoes Are Not Always Red
Believe it or not, tomatoes are not always red. Instead, they can come in a variety of colours including yellow, pink, purple, black and even white. We tend to only see red tomatoes in supermarkets due to quality standards, but if you head to your local farm shop or greengrocer, you may just find multiple colour varieties.
2. There Are Over 10 Thousand Varieties Of Tomato
There are thought to be more than 3,000 varieties of heirloom or heritage tomatoes currently being grown globally, and more than 15,000 known varieties in total.
3. Tomatoes Are Technically A Fruit
A tomato is technically a fruit that is sometimes considered a vegetable. The confusion arose after the 1890s when the US Supreme Court named it a vegetable for taxation purposes. A fruit is defined as the edible part of the plant containing seeds, such as a tomato, whereas a vegetable is the stem, leaf or root.
4. Tomatoes Have Been to Space
Yes, that’s right, tomatoes have travelled to outer space. 600,000 tomato seeds went to the International Space Station before being grown in classrooms all over Canada as part of the ‘Tomatosphere I, II, III and IV’ experiments. These experiments happened due to a desire to understand the effect of outer space on seed growth and development.
5. The First Tomatoes were Gold and Considered an Aphrodisiac
When tomatoes were first introduced to Europe in the 16th Century, they were small, golden and cherry sized. This appearance gave them the name ‘golden apples’. Many European countries took this as inspiration and named them with gold names, such as the German ‘goldapfel’. The French were also convinced tomatoes were aphrodisiacs and named them “love apples.”
And as always have a chilled day from the Viking
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