You’re probably familiar with this classic debate: are tomatoes fruits or vegetables? People on either side of the argument can make good arguments either way. Tomatoes are fruits because they contain seeds and come from the reproductive organs of the vines they grow on; they’re vegetables because they’re not as sweet or sugary and aren’t eaten the same way as fruits.
Botanists, culinary artists, and nutritionists have different ways of distinguishing what makes food a fruit or vegetable, and in a way, they’re all correct. Tomatoes are both simultaneously, but they’re not the only plant-based foods that straddle this line. Here are several others that are usually called vegetables but botanically are fruits.
What Distinguishes A Fruit from A Vegetable?
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In culinary terms, a fruit or vegetable is defined by its taste, aroma, nutritional content, and uses in meals. To chefs (and the U.S. Department of Agriculture), avocados, tomatoes, and butternut squash are all vegetables because they have savory flavors compared to sweet or tart fruits like apples and bananas. Vegetables are also usually prepared and served as side dishes or main courses, while fruits can be eaten individually, squeezed into juices, or used in desserts. While both are nutritious, fruits tend to have higher amounts of natural sugar and calories, while vegetables generally have higher water content.
Botanists view the dividing lines differently. Scientifically, a fruit is a seed-bearing structure that comes from a plant’s ovary, while a vegetable is any edible part of a plant that doesn’t come from its ovary, which includes the leaves, roots, stems, tubers, bulbs, and flowers. Botanists consider avocados, tomatoes, and butternut squash all fruits because they come from the flowering part of their respective plants and contain seeds.
Culinary Vegetables That Are Botanical Fruits
Corn
Corn is interesting since it can accurately be called a vegetable, fruit, and grain. The USDA considers fresh corn a starchy vegetable since it’s usually cooked on the cob and either served as a side dish or mixed with other vegetables, while the department considers fully mature, dry corn a kind of grain. Botanically, however, corn is a kind of fruit because it’s a seed derived from the flower or ovary of the corn plant; since its seed coat or husk is tightly fused with its fleshy interior, corn is also considered a grain.
Avocados
Since avocados are lower in sugar and higher in fiber than most fruits, they’re generally considered a vegetable and used in savory recipes like guacamole or sweet recipes like avocado smoothies. Botanically, however, avocados are berries since they consist of a soft outer layer called an endocarp and one large seed in the middle.
Tomatoes
Like avocados, tomatoes are botanically berries because they consist of many small seeds surrounded by a thick pulp, but did you know that tomatoes were once the center of a legal battle in the United States? In the 1880s, the Nix family tried to circumvent the U.S. Congress’s Tariff Act of 1883, which imposed a 10% tax on vegetables but not fruit, by declaring the tomatoes they imported to the U.S. as fruit. When New York port collector Edward Hedden tried collecting the tax, the Nix family sued him, and the case went all the way to the Supreme Court.
In the 1893 case Nix v. Hedden, Supreme Court Justice Horace Gray wrote the court’s majority opinion. In his ruling, Gray stated that while botanically tomatoes, cucumbers, squashes, beans, and peas are they “fruit of a vine,” all of them are generally eaten as part of the main course, unlike fruits that are generally eaten as desserts. The Court ruled that legally tomatoes were vegetables.
Cucumbers
Botanically, cucumbers are identified as a fruit because they develop from the flowers of cucumber plants and contain seeds. Since they’re not as sweet as fruits and have tougher textures than they do, cucumbers are considered a vegetable by chefs and dietitians, usually stocked in produce sections at grocery stores, and often used in savory dishes.
Pumpkins
In a culinary sense, pumpkins straddle the line between a fruit and a vegetable because they can be used to make main course meals like soups and stews as well as sweet desserts like pies. In a botanical sense, however, pumpkins are solidly a fruit, since they grow out of the flowers of pumpkin vines and contain many, many seeds — as anyone who’s ever carved out a pumpkin to make a jack-o-lantern knows.
Peas
It’s like two peas in a pod — well, actually, any number of peas in a pod, because the pod and peas together form the fruit of the pea plant. The pod itself is the fruit that contains the seeds, or peas, of the plant. When talking about them in a culinary sense, peas are classified as a vegetable and are cooked into dishes all around the world, from Indian curries to Chinese stir-fry to Greek split pea soups.
Jalapeño Peppers
Jalapeño peppers are often classified as a vegetable due to their spicy, pungent flavor (caused by the capsaicin in their flesh) and their uses in salads, salsas, and savory dishes like stews and fajitas. Like avocados and tomatoes, though, the peppers are botanically berries since their flesh contains the seeds of the vines they grow on. In fact, not only Jalapeños but also chili, serrano, poblano, and other peppers all fall under the category of fruit.
Final Thoughts
As shown by the examples above, when you get down to the roots, all these vegetables are also fruits, and vice-versa. How you choose to define them depends on whether you’re looking at them as a botanist, a nutritionist, a chef, a gardener, a shopper, or just an interested party.
Still, it’s worth considering how arbitrary these dividing lines and how diverse the ways of classifying these different foods often are. Imagine how rich our palates can be when we can see how all these foods work equally well as fruits and vegetables.
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