Nature Is Wonky: Discuss
Fruit and vegetables are under a lot of pressure these days. It’s not just about taste, or how and where they’re grown – they have to be glamorous as well.
Late last year, I was horrified to find that the European Union was scrapping laws on the precise measurements of 26 types of fruit and vegetable. What horrified me was that there were laws to scrap. It seems that years ago, strict guidelines were laid down prohibiting the sale of foodstuffs that don’t reflect a standardized shape – as if Nature should conform to some edible version of the International System Of Units. A banana like a question mark? Offensive and vile. A carrot with an extra leg? My eyes, my eyes! And so on.
If these foodstuffs didn’t measure up – they were officially deemed unfit for sale. This amounted to an estimated 20% of the British harvest that couldn’t be sold (as if it didn’t have enough problems already), driving food prices even higher. No sale? It gets thrown away (oh good, we are pleased). Outcry? You bet – from producers and customers alike, after fiascoes like retailer J Sainsbury being told it couldn’t sell forked carrots relabeled as “witch’s fingers” for Halloween. Sorry, kiddies, off you pop – Europe has spoken.
So this ludicrous system is being ditched on July 1st, and good riddance. But is this worrying trend going to go away? Are we going to start obsessing over how our food looks before it’s cooked? It’s a fact that science is learning the genetic mechanisms that determine food-shape; at the moment, tomatoes are under the spotlight. We could be years away from the commercial version of beauty contests – but for now, from July 1st, I’ll be aiming for the wonkiest, lumpiest fruit and vegetables I can find. No matter what Eurocrats might think, they’re the real shape of things to come.
Image: Brettf
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4 Comments
April 2nd, 2009 at 6:09 am
I’m with you Mike. Bring on the crazy veggies, I’ll have my own beauty contest for them with the kids.
April 2nd, 2009 at 8:08 pm
My first vegetable garden ever was a small plot of carrots, and it just so happened the soil was sorta rocky. Well, the carrots grew wonderfully, they were huge! But boy, they sure looked funny, after dodging pebbles, rocks and gravel in that sandy Florida soil. Two legged, three legged carrots. I loved my strange and delightful creatures. I took pictures of them, hardly wanted to eat them! But then…of course I did.
April 3rd, 2009 at 11:24 am
If it looks like a duck… http://www.flickr.com/photos/alexgee/271321325/
April 8th, 2009 at 3:10 am
I agree, folks, that’s the problem with unique, one-off veggies. It’s easy to bond with them, because yes, they *are* quirkily beautiful. I remember my uncle on his allotment digging up a carrot that was the same shape as his nose. He treasured it.
And I don’t think I could ever chop up that zucchini duck Sara links to there.
Maybe it’s all about objectifying food. Maybe if our food is more lovable, we don’t want to chop it up, as Sarah says. And maybe that’s part of the reason behind these measurement regulations, and something the big food traders are afraid of…
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