Fruits contain seeds. Vegetables consist of roots, stems, and leaves. Just because we consider some produce to be our veggies in our savory meals, doesn't mean they are technically a vegetable.
Although these fruits tend to be more mild and savory in flavor, they come from the flower of the plant they grow on. They also have seeds or a pit. In the kitchen, it doesn't really matter if the plant product you're using is a fruit or a vegetable—vegetables can be used in dessert hello, carrot cake and fruit can be used in savory dishes, like a summery dinner salad.
Although it won't change your cooking too much, it's always good to know what you're dealing with, especially if you are growing the produce yourself. And, your new edible food knowledge may help you at your next trivia night. By Jenny Krane May 24, Save Pin FB More. Comments Add Comment. In general terms, fruits are usually sweet and vegetables are savory. Fruits are usually eaten as dessert, and vegetables as a main course.
Fruits are often succulent and edible when raw. More technical dictionary definitions recognize a fruit as an edible reproductive body of a plant. Hedden, which established that the tomato should be classified as a vegetable rather than a fruit under U.
Customs regulations. A fruit is a mature, ripened ovary, along with the contents of the ovary. The ovary is the ovule-bearing reproductive structure in the plant flower. The ovary serves to enclose and protect the ovules, from the youngest stages of flower development until the ovules become fertilized and turn into seeds. Eventually, the fruit functions to spread the seeds or to attract dispersers.
There are many different kinds of fruit—from dry to fleshy, from dehiscent splitting open to indehiscent and from single seed to many-seeded. Under the botanical definition of fruit, many things that are commonly called vegetables are in fact fruits for example, eggplant, green beans, okra, and, yes, tomatoes.
Acorns, maple keys, and the outside of sunflower seeds are also considered fruits. They too develop from a series of transformations of the carpel, and protect, store, and help to scatter the seeds of a flowering plant. Every single fruit, regardless of whether it looks like the kind of fruit we are used to seeing in the produce section, has three distinct layers—the exocarp outside , mesocarp middle , and endocarp inside.
Together, these layers form the pericarp [ 1 ]. Although these layers are sometimes hard to tell apart, they can be identified within most fruits you eat. Fruits are usually classified based on tissue types, texture, shape, dehiscence when the fruit splits open as a stage of development, like peas , and other morphological characteristics. Fruits can be divided into two main categories: fleshy fruits and dry fruits [ 1 , 2 ].
Fleshy fruits have high water content in the pericarp, and a fleshy mesocarp once they are mature. This means that fleshy fruits are juicier than dry fruits. The group of fleshy fruits includes many of the fruits that you may find in the grocery store, and many sweet fruits, such as peaches and apples.
Pomegranates, although we eat the seed and not the fruit, also fall under this category, because their pericarp is soft and fleshy. Avocados, peaches, plums, and other fruits with pits are also fleshy fruits, because they have a thick and fleshy mesocarp Figure 2.
Peppers, cucumbers, and tomatoes are also examples of fleshy fruits, even though they are usually referred to as vegetables Figure 2. In fact, most edible fruits fall into the category of fleshy fruits. These fruits use animals, such as birds or humans, to disperse the seeds. Dry fruits are hard and dry when they are fully mature Figures 3A—C. The pericarp of dry fruits still has three layers—exocarp, mesocarp, and endocarp—but compared with fleshy fruits, they are thinner and do not have as much water.
Sometimes the pericarp is in direct contact with the seed, making it hard to tell the fruit apart from the seed. Most dry fruits do not depend on animals to spread their seeds.
Instead, they use other mechanisms, such as dehiscence Figures 3A,B to free the seeds, or using water or the wind to blow their seeds away think of dandelions: the slightest wind will send the fruits, equipped with parachute-like hairs, flying away.
A strawberry is an example of a dry fruit. If you look closely at a strawberry, you will notice specks on the outside Figure 3D. Each of those specks is a dry fruit, called an achene; the sweet, red flesh of the strawberry is not actually part of the fruit. It is part of the flower that becomes fleshy and edible. Some other examples of dry fruits are corn and pistachios.
A simple fruit develops from one single ovary, such as a peach or a tomato Figure 2D. An aggregate fruit forms from multiple ovaries in a single flower. Strawberries and blackberries are examples of aggregate fruits Figure 3D. Lastly, a multiple fruit develops from multiple ovaries of multiple flowers.
Pineapples are a good example of aggregate fruits.
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