4.15.05 Members of the ag committee in the New Jersey Assembly, going where few have gone before, have approved a bill which would designate the Jersey tomato as the State Vegetable.
In doing so, the lawmakers opened a can of …..well, tomato paste.
It raised the question, once again, is the tomato a fruit or a vegetable?
We consulted the Columbia Encyclopedia where we learned, for example, that the tomato was once considered poisonous and was known as the “love apple”; that indeed, all parts of the plant are poisonous except the fruit (note the word) ; that it is the most widely used canned vegetable (note the word) ; that three-quarters of the annual crop goes into juice, soups, catsup, pastes and the like, and that the tomato is the third largest vegetable (note the word) crop grown in the United States.
The bottom line seems to be this, says the Columbia Encyclopedia, that the tomato, botanically, is a fruit but is considered a vegetable because of its many uses.
Not so says Ed Kee, veteran vegetable specialist at the University of Delaware.
Horticulturally, says Kee, a vegetable is the edible product of a herbaceous plant. A herbaceous plant has stems and other plant parts that are softer and less fibrous than the woody stems of trees and shrubs. This distinguishes vegetables from fruits, which are produced each year on trees and other woody plants that live for more than two years. Most vegetables are annuals, but not all, says Kee. Asparagus and rhubarb are examples of perennials that are vegetables.
In some cases, common usage differs from scientific or horticultural definitions. Many people think cantaloupes and watermelons are fruits, but in a horticultural sense, they are vegetables.
Certainly, Kee concludes, a tomato, a product of a herbaceous plant, is a vegetable. And thus, the New Jersey House Ag Committee is on the right track, despite the good-natured ribbing some of its members have been taking on the subject.
Also worthy of note is that the New Jersey lawmakers appear to have given Kee an idea Perhaps, he confided, Delaware should lobby to have lima beans designated as the state vegetable.