What is the difference between a fruit and a vegetable?
By the way Mr. Natural you’re an idiot – consider going back to school and stop being so homophobic. here is your answer Saniya: thanks to some disagreements among botanists about the term “vegetable” and the efforts of the grocery industry, which have further clouded the difference between fruits and vegetables. Simply put, a fruit is the matured ovary of a plant, which means that it contains seeds, while a vegetable is a plant part, which does not contain seeds, although some vegetables may be used in plant reproduction. Some examples of fruits include well-known specimens like apricots, cherries, blueberries, and apples, but tomatoes, pumpkins, cucumbers, and zucchini are also considered to be fruits botanically, even though many people refer to these fruits as “vegetables” because they are savoury, rather than sweet. This is the result of convenience labeling used in the grocery industry, where fruits and vegetables are differentiated on the basis of whether they are sweet or savor
There are two different ways of defining a “fruit”. A botanist would say that a “fruit” is the seed-bearing part of a plant, the ripened ovary. So a zucchini is a fruit. That’s generally thought of as pedantic. A chef, or a dietician, would tell you that a “fruit” is sweet and a vegetable is not. The USDA would rather have you think of zucchini as a vegetable, and they want you to eat more vegetables but not too much sugary fruit. The Supreme Court actually weighed in on this in the 1893 Nix vs. Hedden case. Fruits and vegetables are taxed differently, and Nix (a tomato importer) wanted it to be a fruit, and Hedden (a tax collector) wanted it to be a vegetable. The Supreme Court decided that because we serve tomatoes with dinner, not with dessert, they’re vegetables. So if a botanist asks you, it’s a fruit. But if a lawyer asks you, it’s a vegetable.
Culinarily speaking, fruits are relatively sweet and desert-like while vegetables are more savory. Also, fruits are a reproductive organ of some plants that hold the seed and vegetable would be a broader term refering to other types of plant anatomy such as the roots or flowers. Some foods like tomatoes could be considered both a fruit and a vegetable.
